Guitar Hero: Nu-Who Season 9

Trailer? Trailer.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QVMUPZm04MA

haa

ps this is going to rule so hard, it will make season 2 of nu-Who retroactively disappear

This looks good! Capaldi lives round the corner from us. When he was still Malcolm Tucker, we'd find him standing in front of our house, grimacing ominously and talking on his cellphone. Now we see him walking down th street with a Tesco plastic bag and have to try really hard not to stalk him home.

Some more stuff, kinda sorta

http://io9.com/peter-capaldi-the-doctor-is-not-a-guy-1716900060

Finding one suggestion I heard today about who Masie is going to turn out to be surprising because i didn't think anything prior had suggested it possible. Somebody said that she thought she was a younger Missy. I think that's pretty fundamentally unlikely since Missy is going to reappear anyway but it did have me asking the question about trappings a timelord takes on when getting a regeneration. There has been no suggestion that there would be a previous history attached that wasn't carried over from the incarnation one is regenerating from has there?
Like the moment of birth of that individual character is that moment of regeneration, it's not like to give a bad example Quantum Leap where one is stepping into a Timeline that has its own past. Or I'm sure there have been other stories where the character manifests in various guises with existing histories instead of just possessing an existing character for a temporary period.
So all past memories & experiences of the new incarnation are taken from the previous existence with nothing added by dint of the reincarnation are they? The only differences are going to be personality quirks not lived experience, or are they?

Also wondering about coexistence of various incarnations in the same timeline. It's not likely is it? There couldn't be a younger Missy growing older on the same planet or in the same galaxy/universe/whatever as a John Simm could there. I thought it had been said by a number of Doctors that they can't cross their own timelines though I think that's also been shown to be false.

Also wondering if the timeline of a timelord and a human being are in any way similar. Does a timelord's run in the same direction even but just for much longer? Like timelord companion between adventures or Tardis time is presumably living the usual 24/7 human existence probably including a 9-5 or similar job to keep oneself together. Whereas not sure what a timelord would be doing. are timelines running parallel, is doctor off gallivanting around the universe for a different time interval than the humans he interacts with part of the time? I assume this mainly means the doctor since he's the one timelord shown interracting with humans.
I was also trying to remember if there was a major isolationist policy for Gallifreyans that he was about the only one disobeying, apart from the Master. I don't remember there being many Timelords chanced upon elsewhere than Gallifrey throughout the history of the show. Unless any of the characters before Gallifrey was introduced would be adopted into being from there, people like the Meddling Monk and the Michael Gough character the Celestial Toymaker. If that is likely.
Really not sure where he has chanced upon evidence of them elsewhere and if they have the same technology for travel as he does you would expect them to do so unless they actually had policy not to. Unless they are just a lot better at tidying up than he is. But I think that was one of the major reasons they intervened at the point that Troughton gave way to Pertwee, that the Doctor had gone around interfering in timestreams he shouldn't have been. Think it was given as the reason he was stranded on his beloved Earth

Initial point being more that Missy came into being as a near middle aged woman not a younger woman who grew older into her. Or stepped into being as a middle aged woman who didn't have a past created where she was younger to fit that incarnation. That's not the way regeneration has ever been seen to work in the series anyway.

Spoilers: the answer to all those questions is "it's not important as long as they can get a good story out of it".

I am hoping that "and I save people" is being used ironically or sarcastically, getting Davies flashbacks otherwise.

Okay okay I'll play along:

Initial point being more that Missy came into being as a near middle aged woman not a younger woman who grew older into her.

Are you basing this on anything at all?

I thought it had been said by a number of Doctors that they can't cross their own timelines though I think that's also been shown to be false.

Time Lords outlawed crossing your own timeline due to the catastrophic paradoxes they can create. All this really means is that the dramatic stakes are elevated every time the Doctor does it because it's indicative of a crisis so severe that the Time Lords/the Doctor is willing to risk imploding the entire universe to overlap incarnations.

Okay okay I'll play along:

Initial point being more that Missy came into being as a near middle aged woman not a younger woman who grew older into her.

Are you basing this on anything at all?

― Andrew Farrell, Friday, July 10, 2015 8:15 PM (42 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Previous onscreen regenerations of the Doctor mainly & possibly the Master himself, though I think the only time that's shown he's taking on an existing character's physical form from that character.
Missy, is played by Michelle Gomez an actress who is nearly 50 hence middle aged , if nothing else has happened in the interim this character was manifest as the Master in John Simm incarnation before that. If she changed from one to the other in some form of real time and hasn't been off doing something else in the interim for a number of years. Hard to tell, if she can travel time and space freely if she would be experiencing things on the same time frame that Earth is, but I thought this was supposed to be the next big project for the character or manifestation of life force or whatever you call something that hasn't got 100% linear continuity.

Has occurred to me that in the recreation of synapses, or whatever takes place in a regeneration, different memories or takes on those memories might be formed.
But the idea that a younger version of this regeneration version of character or lifeforce is not one of the previous incarnations/actors' versions of the character hasn't really been suggested as far as I know. Not to the extent that regeneration alters timeline to give this incarnation an earlier life of its own which would be the alternative.

Not sure who Maisie Williams' character actually is but it is clear that the Doctor recognises her.

Let's try that again. A rephrasing (which I hope doesn't screw up your original meaning):

Initial point being more that Missy didn't come into being as a younger woman who grew older into her.

Are you basing that on anything at all? Bearing in mind she is a Time Lord, with her own TARDIS.

Not sure who Maisie Williams' character actually is but it is clear that the Doctor recognises her.

my money is on "young Clara" still

https://40.media.tumblr.com/0dcf29574292cc3f47cad486fab26c7b/tumblr_nrcpchwcUz1qbypg1o1_1280.jpg

Should've bought this today. :\

Was trying to think yesterday has any non-timelord character that has changed appearance because the actor changed had a story retrofit to explain why. I assume that there must be recurring characters throughout the history that this would apply to but can't think.

As fascinating and relevant to the unaired new series as that is, the interesting bit of Who promo I've seen / not avoided this weekend is an interview with Moffat and Michelle Gomez, with a lot of great stuff on the newer writers:

TMS: I wanted to ask you on the creative end, you brought a couple of women writers on board this season [TheMarySue.com here fails to copy check either, simply typing "names"], what was that like working with them, and can we expect to see more from them? What are their stories like?

Moffat: Well, you’ve grouped them together though they don’t belong in the same category at all. They’re about as opposite as they could be. Catherine is the only person I’ve ever had to persuade to write Doctor Who. Because she didn’t want to do it. I’d been asking her for years, actually. When I first did “Blink” all those years ago, Russell sent me her script for Torchwood, which was great. He said, “This is another message from the past story, you gotta not bump into it.” And I remember saying to him, “She’s brilliant, why don’t we get her?” He said, “She doesn’t really watch Doctor Who…”

[All laugh]

We decided why don’t we try Catherine again, and for the first time in my life in this job, I sat and pitched a story and said, “I want you to write this.” And she got into it. But what was interesting about Catherine —quite different from Sarah— is that she doesn’t really know modern Doctor Who or old Doctor Who. It took her no time at all to get the hang of her Doctor Who work. She wrote a great Doctor, and she understood it perfectly.

And then started watching it, it’s quite funny, she’ll come in and say, “It’s very emotional, Doctor Who, isn’t it?” [Interviewers laugh] It’s the most nakedly emotional show on television, and it has been for ten years.

Sarah comes from a very, very different category, and a very interesting one, because only she and Jamie Mathieson both belong to this category, would both describe themselves as Doctor Who fans, would both describe themselves as long-term Doctor Who fans… haven’t seen the old show. Haven’t seen it. Don’t know anything about it.

Now me, and Russell, and Mark, and Chris, and Toby, we’re all fans of the old show. For us, Doctor Who, in our hearts, is the old show. 4×3, very old. Multicam. That’s what we think Doctor Who is. They think Doctor Who is that modern one. [Chuckles] And there’s a part of me—even though I am so steeped in it—that says, “You realize this isn’t the real one?”

Haha we've all been watching fanfic.

There's this weird story going round, that apparently Moffat definitely ruled out ever having a female doctor, but I read his quote, and I can't see where he says it. He alludes to having put his opinion on the subject in the show, and I don't get where? Didn't he just have a timelord switch gender last season? That seems pro-female-doctor to me. The discourse surrounding this show is so weird to me, sometimes.

Counter arg is that Master switching genders inoculates the Doctor himself from switching.

ok... is that in the show?

No, I mean from a showrunning POV.

Moffat has repeatedly pointed out in response to hysterical accusations that he's blocking us from our rightful female Doctor that he was the first person to put in the regular show that Time Lords *could* change gender (in 2010) and the first and only to then put the actuality on screen, still just months ago. (Obv JNT used to say it was possible every three years in the '80s, to tabloids.) This is without even bringing up that he previously had the Doctor change gender on-screen in 1997. He's not required to debunk new accusations every two months, just because tumblr exists.

Shot of Wookey Hole at 00:40

Was trying to think yesterday has any non-timelord character that has changed appearance because the actor changed had a story retrofit to explain why. I assume that there must be recurring characters throughout the history that this would apply to but can't think.

This happened with Jamie for one episode of The Mind Robber

I think he went back to Fraser Hines straight after though. Was thinking more fo character changes from having face A to face B because actor changes permanently . Then the difference gets explained. Assume that with a history as long as Dr Who's there must be at least one instance of this but can't think of one.
& assumed that there must be recurring characters like that.

Only one i could think of was the last human being who is shown both as stretched out skin and an embodied actress but that isn't quite the same thing.

Was set off by the apparent recognition of Maisie by the Doctor in the trailer, but that might get longer explanation anyway.
I've watched the series through and can't think of instances but thought that might be down to me having a head full of flu/cold whatever.
& been told taht a timelord is going to recognise another timelord was something that had come up during the 10 era. So assume that means timelordd recognises the personality outside of the change. Except where it crosses gender divides apparently though that is 2 doctors later.

In the same vein, I don't think they actually got John Barrowman in to play the Face of Bo.

Same face different characters is more of a problem with Doctor Who.

Oh and of course there's the recasting of the First Doctor post-Hartnell, though that's obviously not explained.

Just watched the trailer, who's the kid in the end of it supposed to be? River? The Doctor's daughter from that one episode? I can't think of anyone else to whom he'd react in that way...

Also, when the heck are they going to go back to the Doctor trying to find Gallifrey, which was teased at the end of the 50th anniversary episode? I thought they would've done something with that subplot during the last season, but it was only addressed a bit in the finale, when the Master gave the Doctor the wrong cordinates. Since the Doctor knows Gallifrey is out there, you'd think he'd put a bit more effort into trying to locate it?

I don't think the Face of Bo is necessarily Harkness anyway, could just have been an ironic joke where people were expected to read that into it and it not actually be true. Sounded like it was a competition that might have had more than one winner over time so young Harkness was a Face of Bo not necessarily the same one that's infinitely old. Could never work out how a fixed point in time could lose its limbs in that way anyway.

& Tuomas the girl at the end of the trailer is the Maisie Williams who I was talking about earlier. Suggestions for who she is have been Susan (Doctor''s grandaughter) Jenny (Doctor's daughter), a younger Missy, another incarnation of the Master (unlikely since Missy is back in this season), another humanoid manifestation of the Tardis and possibly a couple of others.

I don't think the Face of Bo revelation was supposed to be taken as a joke, it certainly wasn't framed as one... And since it fit some of the earlier clues (Captain Jack's immortality, Bo calling the Doctor "old friend"), and Bo's identity hasn't been brought up ever since, I think it's canon that Bo = Jack.

Sorry about not reading the earlier posts properly, I had no idea who Maisie Williams is, so I didn't know who you're talking about. I doubt she's yet another manifestation of the Tardis (do they really want to do that plot again?) or a younger Missy (would it make sense that she reincarnated as a teen, then waited for 30+ years before putting her masterplan in the S8 finale motion?). I'm really hoping it's Jenny, because that was a subplot that was left totally open, and she seemed like a cool character... I guess it'd be weird for them not to get the original actress though, unless she's unavailable?

Not sure Jenny actually had the power of regeneration. When she apparently died she came back as the same actress. That that actress is Mrs David Tennant may be the reason behind that though.

She's also Peter Davison, Jr

That Face of Bo thing does seem to be open to interpretation I would have thought. It's certainly not been the older face of Bo saying that he is the later part of the younger Harkness's life . & the younger Harkness does say that he had this role in incidental fashion. Not sure what is said that leads to him saying it but what the doctor says after it makes it look like it may or may not be.

Not sure what does constitute canon or whether something like taht would be further explored if characters aren't going to be used in depth through later stories. Did Face of bo reappear during Smith's doctor, not sure if Harkness was fighting to save Amy Pond's stolen baby or not.

I would tend to find something said in passing not to be absolutely concrete in terms of canon. & would personally want something more definite to think of it as an absolute.
But not sure what is down in writing anywhere and still think it might be something that was a writer's in-joke or knowing wink something.

I had no idea who Maisie Williams is

Huh, you don't watch Game of Thrones, Tuomas?

Since the Doctor knows Gallifrey is out there, you'd think he'd put a bit more effort into trying to locate it?

a) because he was always so desperate to get to Gallifrey during the parts of the 38 years pre-nu-Who that didn't have I4n L3vine suggesting content

b) because every time he got involved with Gallifrey during Saward / L3vine it made for fascinating stories that really enriched the show and the character, not impossibly stupid and tedious nonsense, + collars

(obv Invasion Of Time was the damaging trendsetter there, but I grew up on the novelisation of it, so I can't hate it)

Pertinent to the thread title:

https://twitter.com/pigeonspotting/status/644658270448295936

NO SPOILERS

I'm inclined to think the Doctor recognising Maisie in the trailer is misdirection. She's in two episodes, the first being called 'The Girl Who Died', so we're obviously being set up to think she comes back from the dead. That's why the Doctor recognises her and looks dumbfounded. It could well mean she's a Timelord, but who knows. The usual Missy/Clara/Susan/Rani speculation is always good fun, but I'd be inclined to think they introduce a new character, albeit one who ties into Who-lore in a significant way.

Blimey, this starts tonight.

That was bobbins. (I'm aware that no Who show discussion can start until someone has proffered this opinion, so I'm willing to take the hit (but no, it was bobbins))

Tho I did wonder how many other people tuned in a few minutes earlier, stared confusedly at the upper middle aged portly gay couple on Celebrity Pointless, and then shouted "Fucking Hell, it's Hale and Pace!". I'd be a happier man if any part of Doctor Who was as surprising.

You're correct, it was bobbins.

http://38.media.tumblr.com/7ade0d67ac8ac4a3bdbb7716cbfffb91/tumblr_myv7siJVXv1rmwez8o5_r2_400.gif

RTD tribute ep, like The Power Of Three.

Power of Three was much better. Don't remember many RTD episodes this incoherent, which is saying something. Some good moments, sure, but a lot that was hectic, forced and embarrassing, and definitely too much old continuity bollocks for a first episode (speaking as someone who enjoys old continuity bollocks). Unusually for Doctor Who (even for bad episodes) I felt relieved when it was over.

Hey ho though - glad it's back. Looking back, Eleventh Hour and Impossible Astronaut have been the only good season openers, so dodgy starts don't necessarily herald a bad season. But can we skip to episode three next week?

Also, Brig's daughter reliably dull.

And guitar scene probably most cringeworthy thing since Tennant's marathon run.

Cluttered as fuck, but totally coherent.

I love Michelle Gomez.

sic otm.

it was like a yard sale for the first 2/3 but i dug the last part on (spoiler) with (spoiler)

i was ~almost~ ok with guitar cheese but the pretty woman riff made me want to kick in the tv

also i thought the whole medieval part was supposed to be a Vegas Excalibur/Medieval Times theme restaurant, i didnt realize it was *actually* meant to be medieval times, lol

i dont care how crap it gets though, i fuckin love capaldi-who

I thought this wildly out of character nonsense that worked well plotwise

Anything too scrazy for young tykes in this one?

I meant to type "scary" but actually "scrazy" is maybe more what I meant

Yeah the first five minutes are if you have access to a muddy field - that was good (but unconnected to the rest of the episode (oh lord Sarff's tour de space was tedious - did they blow the entire budget on the first episode?))

presumably buying him a swegway.

that was good (but unconnected to the rest of the episode

Except for setting up the cliffhanger, the hunt you disparage, the central conflict, and the Doctor's eventual onscreen behaviour and previous absenteeism

Also plenty of shows get by okay with pre-title sequences that ARE completely disconnected from the latter elements of the show. And this was great and creepy enough to have been worthwhile even it was disconnected.

Plus while you don't at all need to know it is in several ways a callback to the opening of Genesis Of The Daleks to appreciate it or follow this ep -- would you criticise that opening for being unconnected to the rest of ep 1, or the story as a whole?

anyway HEY TRACER HAND yeah that bit will spook the shit out of tinies, and there are some scary bits later too. But watch it with 'em and they'll be fine. Nightmares are healthy.

I don't think the previous absenteeism was explained? But I may have shoved skewers in my ears after Pretty Woman, the subtitles may have glossed over that bit.

I'm not sure what you're asking me about in the third panel? If it's the opening sequence of Genesis of the Daleks, I don't really remember it or have any views on it?

I do appreciate the sampled voiceovers exculpatory reminder that anything involving Davros (Genesis aside) has always been dull overwrought shite, though.

Always great to see how many of the Doctor's pivotal moments have been recorded by CCTV.

Thing I disliked most was the temporary 'killing' of Missy (again) and Clara. What's the point?

I feel like a lot of a Moff episodes start roaringly well and then you can literally point to the second where they fall apart. With this one it was the hashtag joke. With "Listen" he at least saved the awfulness until the very last minute. Which is why he's so frustrating, because when he fucks it up, you at least know he's *capable* of doing better, unlike the other writers.

Anyway - Capaldi and Coleman still great. Missy is reaching the "too much of a good thing" point for me.

Re: coherence - why was the planet invisible, and why did the Doctor walk into an obvious traps again - guilt alone? Presumably there were micro moments of dialogue to explain that (or maybe it'll be lampshaded into next week's episode) but I missed them. (I am slightly deaf mind.)

this was alright. very slightly disappointing. didn't mind the guitar bit. kind of sick of davros.

Viewers in their millions deserted Doctor Who as it returned to BBC One for a new series, according to overnight figures.

An average 4.6m watched Peter Capaldi back for his second series playing the Time Lord, compared with 6.8m for his full debut last year.

It was roundly beaten by ITV's X Factor, which had 7.3 million viewers.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-34307519

Aw, dammit. NO MORE SEXY DOCTORS

bound to be if ratings dont pick up

DW audience is increasingly likely to watch the show on demand, especially since it's been in a later timeslot. As-broadcast ratings don't mean much.

headlines like that can put people off though

They can?

IS THIS THE END FOR THE DOCTOR?

X Factor's catch-up will be negligible.

headlines like that can put people off though

The show has been running for ten years. British press have been running panicked "Doctor Who ratings are falling! The show is in danger!" stories for nine years.

haha longer than that

Hey guys amazing news! Despite no promotional blitz, being up against X-Factor, having to be pushed back to start after Strictly, no debuting new Doctor, and keeping the returning villain a secret, this goofy show for kids about a space wizard was the highest rated BBC programme for the day! And the second highest in the country at all!! And was the most-tweeted thing on Twitter!!!! And is the most popular programme on iPlayer today!!!!!

I was just thinking when watching the new episode earlier that when Missy gives Carla a set of choices as to which one is a lie and includes 'I knew him when he was a little girl' and wondered if it was a reference to who Masie Williams turns out to be,but think it may have already been said that she is supposed to be a new character. Also not sure he could cross his timeline just because he'd changed gender. THough the multiple Doctors episodes may put that to question anyway.

Also wondering when the start of the show is set, if the dying Davros is centuries old?
How long the war on Skaro had been? Seems to have been ancient at that point and Davros seems to be ancient in Genesis of the daleks at least. Not sure where that's set relative to other timelines anyway.
Also has the idea that the Thrals being thought of as a peaceful race been long since turned over? I know they started back in '63 as being represented as a semi angelically beautiful bunch of peaceful proto hippies, but I think there has been a story more recently that threw that into extreme question.

also thought did Davros retro engineer anything from being given a sonic screwdriver at that point?
I take it that the Doctor being sent back at the end of the episode is a change in the timeline, so Davros and screwdriver had to work out how to get out of the handmine field originally.

Also first thought on seeing the hands with the eyes in them was a parallel to the front attachment on a Dalek. Assume that's a conscious element in the design though.
Don't think it's Genesis of the Daleks, think it's something more recent.

Thals have not appeared on TV since 1975, at which point they were engaged in a war set several millennia earlier than their initial 1963 appearance, where they were angelic pacifists as a consequence of the thousand-year war.

I peaked at the first thread reactions before I watched the show, and as a result was rather pleasantly surprised. A bit muddled and weirdly paced (as is most WHO tbf), but all very entertaining as sic says, perfectly coherent (some slightly muddy motives aside*).

*Though I'm predicting the Doctor knows what he's doing and it will all be revealed to be his trap for the Daleks in part 2.

IMO that type of plotting would be more appropriate for 7

I don't really have a gripe with the story beyond feeling like it didn't really belong to 12; this would have been a great late-period 10 story, especially the "companionless" stories when he was trying to find himself.

This was fun. Didn't mind the guitar. Ending twist was cool. Man, how many times has the Doctor supposed to have died by now? Not even Clara is phased by it.

This wasn't very good... The first scene with Davros was cool, and the "search for the Doctor" bith that followed was a nice bit of continuity porn, but after having seen the whole episode it felt a bit stupid to waste so much of the episode for that part, when the actual important plot developments of the episode only came during the last 10 minutes, and as a result felt totally rushed. Also, was it really necessary to end the ep on cliffhanger with all these SHOCKING DEATHS, when absolutely everyone knows they'll be reversed the very next episode? Now obviously that's the case with most cliffhangers, but in this series they're a bit more creative than THE MAIN CHARACTERS EXPLODE, OH NO!

And the Medieval Guitar Hero thing was quite silly, but not good-silly, more like the sort of corny thing you'd expect to happen in Doctor Who if it was an American mainstream series, but it felt really out of place here. Actually, the whole scene (time-traveling rock star in Medieval times) reminded me of Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure... Maybe it even was an intentional nod? Regardless, they could've done without it.

A few stray questions that may or may not be answered the next episode:

* Didn't Davros die in season 4? Couldn't they have at least added a line of dialogue explaining how he survived? Well okay, Missy came back from death without an explanation too, but in her case it was already pretty obvious how she might've survived.

* In season 6 destroying the TARDIS made the whole universe implode. Here it gets destroyed too, but nothing like that happens?

* The Doctor is already responsible for countless deaths, right? So why would not saving one kid in the knowledge that he'll grow up to be Space Hitler be the one thing that makes the Doctor so ashamed he wants to die?

"in this series they're usually a bit more creative"

Radio Times saying Capaldi played the music in that scene himself XD XD XD

Good point wrt Bill & Ted, he even teaches them the word "dude".

Then again I will love Bill & Ted for the rest of time.

xpost - I was hoping! yay <3

I, too will love Bill and Ted for the rest of time.

Watched this slightly buzzed after getting home from my friend's wake and it really cheered me up. But also liked the 'Clara is capable and in control until Missy shows up/Missy is in control and capable until Skaro shows up' progression in the episode.

* Didn't Davros die in season 4? Couldn't they have at least added a line of dialogue explaining how he survived?

He died in Season 12 and Season 21 as well - not as often as the Master, but it's entirely in character for him to show up again and again as well (to ever-diminishing returns).

* In season 6 destroying the TARDIS made the whole universe implode.

I don't remember this?

Here it gets destroyed too, but nothing like that happens?

I suspect there's the faintest outlying chance that it's possible that it hasn't really been destroyed.

"Bad Wolf" featured Rose getting "disintegrated", only she was actually teleported by the Daleks elsewhere, so it's not really straining credibility to think the same thing happened with Missy, Clara and the TARDIS had the same thing happen to them.

Fake-killing major characters repeatedly is only slightly better than RTD's old 'someone will definitely diiiie!' thing and then later being all like 'ah I meant like inside, aaaahaha'.

Honestly I'm impressed Danny has stayed dead for as long as he has

^^^

Aw, dammit. NO MORE SEXY DOCTORS

Wait was Capaldi sexy this episode?

I'm wondering if the police box/chamelon circuit interface thing for a TARDIS that actually exists in a different dimension has anything to do with what was destroyed, if anything actually was. Just wondering if the only thing that has been destroyed is the interface from tis dimension to the one that the main part of the TARDIS exists in.
Trying to remember what was said when #9 was around and Rose met her dad, that wound up with an empty police box with no TARDIS inside. Had the interior ceased to be or just the interface/dimensional portal that allows one to access the interior?

Also been wondering with the interior of the TARDIS being in a different dimension to the visible exterior, is it understood that the interior moves alongside the exterior every time that moves. Or is it more static with the exterior being the only thing moving?
Or if it is the latter purely because it would be a conventional thought process that a spaceship be thought to move as one when the TARDIS is a more complex phenomenon.
Is it a pocket universe integrally tied to the exterior that is visible in this universe?
Or is it all a studio convenience for getting a British actor from point a in a story to point b?

* In season 6 destroying the TARDIS made the whole universe implode.

I don't remember this?

Sorry, I mean season 5, not season 6. The whole thing with the stars disappearing and the universe imploding until only Earth is left in the season finale is explained to have happened because the Silence blew up the TARDIS.

Wait was Capaldi sexy this episode?

No, I'm comparing his numbers to Tennant/Smith and hoping he doesn't get replaced with Robert Pattinson or some other nonsense

i'm hoping for harry styles myself

bring back Colin Baker

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-T0MwZn9QgiM/VAMSDcTXJsI/AAAAAAAAETI/LL4CQegOF74/s1600/seventies_porn_colin.jpg

The whole thing with the stars disappearing and the universe imploding until only Earth is left in the season finale is explained to have happened because the Silence blew up the TARDIS.

Take your pick: they blew up the inside of the TARDIS near a known point of time flux, with the doors hacked open, releasing ~time energy~ into that focal point; it was actually their attempt to stop the Doctor reaching Trenzalore by blowing up the TARDIS that generated the entire paradox that created the cracks in the universe, which are what actually 'imploded' everything; it's not really blown up and we'll find out next week.

THere is an episode in the Christopher Ecclestone series where he takes Rose back in time to her parents wedding day. Because the timeline gets changed the forces controlling the Universe release a number of dark, winged creatures that are supposed to clean up time paradoxes.
The TARDIS also winds up as an empty Police box either with the contents destroyed or the interface between them and the dimensional portal that is the TARDIS door being disconnected. I can't remember which. But think either way that there being a physical remnant being left is weird physics.
I still don't really understand the interdimensional connectivity of what is externally visible in the universe the outside is seen in and the dimension that the inside is in.
Would think that if things were being worked out now there would be no need for the interior to actually need to physically move with the outside since it is in another dimension anyway, so could remain statically placed in whatever dimension that was with the outside being projected in whatever location it needed to be. But assume that since it is conventional for a vehicle to move as one, it has always been assumed that the interior of the Tardis is moving with its external portal. Which seems to be more rooted in convention than necessity as far as I can see.
Or is the interior a pocket universe physically dependent on the exterior so needing to move around with it?
Rather than the exterior being a somehow solidified projection from the interior?

I'm wondering if the thing that the Daleks exterminated in the Magician's Apprentice was no more than the visible exterior of something that was actually elsewhere. Which would also tally with the idea that the TARDIS could only be destroyed from inside since it's outside is merely a projection. It has been described as nearly indestructible before hasn't it? Certainly if one is trying to do so from outside.

Or, right, the TARDIS being just a telephone box is an excellent scare which Billie Piper played well off, and that's as far as thought there went (quite rightly).

That episode has the box left as an empty wooden shell with no internal TARDIS. Eccleston goes to unlock the TARDIS, does so and finds the interior missing but a wooden looking structure remaining. I'll have to rewatch it but haven't had time to yet.
Just thinking that if the exterior of the TARDIS is something that is projected from the interior, it should vanish if the inside disappears.
But wondering what of the TARDIS is in the location of the adventure. The Chameleon circuit projects a disguise onto a something which I don't think has ever been shown as a default factory setting version. Or is it all a projection from the dimension that the interior is in?

Obviously in 1963 when the show started there was a need for a location to say the doctor lived in, also a way that he got around from adventure to adventure. So the production team came up with a prop that they worked out could combine both purposes. That prop in turn became iconic and a trademark image of the show. It only appears to be later that the idea of its interior and how it traveled through space was worked out. So subsequently I wonder to what degree that would have been changed if the logistics were worked out in tandem from scratch instead of being details that accumulated to an existing image/prop?
Also not fully conversant with what is understood of the way things supposedly work in a supposed real world setting. Can see stepping into the TARDIS is stepping across a dimensional portal but as to how that works, if the TARDIS Interior is a dimension of its own or what. Just been half thinking that if it is a different dimension then a dimension is a continuous expanse that it would be moving around inside of.

Is it a police box that the first Doctor is seen nicking when Clara interrupts him?

If it is it's a stupid mistake on the part of the production team who made that episode. It should only look like hat when it gets to earth of a certain era.
The master has a similar vehicle that has gone through a number of different looks. & Colin Baker fixed the chameleon circuit and transformed the TARDIS Into a keyboard instrument and something else.
I don't think there is any kind of fixed dimensions range for the size of the interface. It doesn't need to be this size by this size, it is obviously more convenient if the size of opening is convenient for the size of the occupant to fit through.
People have been wondering how they fit a tank through the doors for one to appear in that medieval scene. I've been wondering if there is a need for the TARDIS's chameleon circuit disguised depiction to actually be of a size to contain the size of portal needed or if it just needs to be a placeholder so that the Timelord knows where his portal is located. It is going to be easier for a tv production team on a fixed budget to depict that process as a hole/doorway/whatever that an actor can enter than to rig up a way of depicting a portal in open space, at least it would be until the technology available to them caught up with their imaginations.

Well, the TARDIS itself can change size - very large in that Trenzalore story, very small in that excellent living graffiti one from last year - though both were seen as a malfunction, I think.

If the physical police box TARDIS was simply something to the "real" TARDIS, which exists in another dimension, projects to our plane, that wouldn't explain the times TARDIS has been stolen or is otherwise missing, and the Doctor can't use it. Shouldn't the TARDIS then be able to project the physical box anywhere the Doctor is, and it would therefore be impossible for him to lose it?

I'm not sure that the Doctor can have more than one interface working at a time. So if the physical manifestation of that interface is moved, the Doctor's access to the interior is subsequently limited.
To a certain extent I'd think a lot of that would be down to convention thanks to the prop being what it is. A wooden box that is therefore tangible and thought to be the object possessing an interior, rather than just the physical manifestation of an access to an interior that lay elsewhere. Also the idea that if this object is placed here it is here at this point until it is somehow moved somewhere else. Locked in place, would think that if it was designed now he'd be able to call it to him by some device attached to his keys, if he can't already do that. But that is a development on convention and culture from the early 60s.

Not really sure of the supposed reality of the thing, have seen mapped layouts of the conventional layout of a tardis interior and comment about the exterior other than that represented in this case by a police box. Would like something like that Hayes manual that they have the tshirt of to see how the thing was actually supposed to work.

From my understanding the spectrum of possibilities for the appearance of the exterior is nearly boundless both in shape and size. But is presumably going to need to be within a certain range to be depicted for a tv audience. also to be something that is not outlandishly unrecognisable since it both needs to blend in to its surroundings and be recognisable/familiar to its target audience.
& it's only what was current at the time that designated the police box was picked. & it is only relevant to a number of years in the history of the UK that that form would be relevant. i was wondering how much they proliferated around the Uk at the time the show first appeared and also how long it took before they weren't around much anymore. Tegan seems to recognise the purpose of one beside a road in the late 70s/early 80s but I don't think they were in use then. Just occurring to me that the first time we see the famous one it is located in a scrap yard, they weren't already on the way out in the early 60s were they?

But that is a development on convention and culture from the early 60s.

There's probably plenty the TARDIS can do that the Doctor never does with it because he doesn't know how to, it's broken, or he's just got his habits/disdain for Time Lord tech/contrariness. Same goes for the writers, I guess.

I was trying to remember if Smith actually did call the TARDIS to him remotely on a few occasions. I think he did.
He certainly had it relocate to him at the end of the episode with the ice Warrior in the Russian submarine.
Which is probably not something people would have thought of doing 30 years ago.

Am just thinking that there is a lot probably dictated by visual and dramatic convention and the idea that you don't want to move too fast for the audience.
Convention is pretty inevitably going to change over time though.

Presumably Time Lords have mastered teleportation, which would make being captured by bad guys basically a non-issue and reduce the total running time of the average Doctor Who episode by about 75%.

The Chameleon circuit projects a disguise onto a something which I don't think has ever been shown as a default factory setting version.

It has, both in TARDIS and SIDRAT.

It only appears to be later that the idea of its interior and how it traveled through space was worked out. So subsequently I wonder to what degree that would have been changed if the logistics were worked out in tandem from scratch instead of being details that accumulated to an existing image/prop?

I think it's less than 90 seconds after the first sight of the TARDIS interior where the Doctor explains to Ian exactly how the interior's relation to the exterior functions. (He says "bcz television.")

If it is it's a stupid mistake on the part of the production team who made that episode. It should only look like hat when it gets to earth of a certain era.

It doesn't, it's not, and there's no reason to assume they're stupid.

The master has a similar vehicle that has gone through a number of different looks.

The Master has a TARDIS; I guess that's pretty similar to a TARDIS. The "different looks" are the result of the chameleon circuit functioning normally.

I don't think there is any kind of fixed dimensions range for the size of the interface. It doesn't need to be this size by this size, it is obviously more convenient if the size of opening is convenient for the size of the occupant to fit through.

The Doctor jacked the dimensional control from the Monk's TARDIS in The Time Meddler, leaving the interior too small to enter from its current exterior disguise.

Would like something like that Hayes manual that they have the tshirt of to see how the thing was actually supposed to work.

What is a "Hayes manual", who are "they", what T-shirt are you talking about, and what "thing" are you talking about?

i was wondering how much they proliferated around the Uk at the time the show first appeared and also how long it took before they weren't around much anymore. Tegan seems to recognise the purpose of one beside a road in the late 70s/early 80s but I don't think they were in use then. Just occurring to me that the first time we see the famous one it is located in a scrap yard, they weren't already on the way out in the early 60s were they?

I believe they stopped making new ones in the early 60s, but as they'd been making them since the 1890s, and in the TARDIS-like design since 1929, there were plenty around the islands. They began to be phased out in the 70s.

I was trying to remember if Smith actually did call the TARDIS to him remotely on a few occasions. I think he did.
He certainly had it relocate to him at the end of the episode with the ice Warrior in the Russian submarine.
Which is probably not something people would have thought of doing 30 years ago.

He certainly did not have it relocate to him at the end of the episode with the Ice Warrior in the Russian submarine. That is the exact opposite of what happens at the end of that episode, where the HADS mistakenly rematerialises the TARDIS at the South Pole, and Smith and Clara have to ask for a lift to the exact opposite side of the planet.

If you mean people wouldn't have thought of the Doctor being incompetent enough to incorrectly fix part of the TARDIS 30 years ago, I point you at the entire history of the series. If you mean people wouldn't have thought to invent the HADS 30 years ago, I'll point out that Holmes did it 47 years ago.

When Davros was playing those old clips of him thru carefully edited 'Dalek surveillance footage' I was hoping the Doctor would say something like "oooh don't suppose you've got all of The Chase?!"

The Doctor would probably have the UK DVD, not the US, so he wouldn't need to ask.

Haynes guide to the TARDIS
http://secure.riptapparel.com/aff/C1AA3116252697012DB8AE9EA9051500/index.html

http://www.geeksofdoom.com/2012/02/16/geek-gear-doctor-who-tardis-service-repair-manual
is the TARDIS Haynes manual tshirt. Based on the idea that there would be a similar manual to the TARDIS as there are to various motor vehicles. It only exists as a tshirt, I had see it as an image online before seeing what it actually was. I thought it was some show related book when I first saw it.

http://game-over-custom.deviantart.com/art/Shirt-TARDIS-Haynes-Manual-252258008 also

Liked Davros going on about predator and prey in the ecstasy of crisis

maaaan, that's a long bow even for you! xp

Since there are Haynes manuals for Gerry Anderson vehicles, having one for the Tardis would be a nice thing to have.
Haynes manuals are pretty handy. Rather well known too.

why would anybody want all of "the chase"? that one exists complete in the archive, and is additionally terrible. it's "power of the daleks" that everyone wants (and will probably never have- because of copyright squabbles over the daleks hardly any copies of that one or "evil of the daleks" were made)

i liked missy tickling the dalek's balls

THis is pretty interesting http://whoniverse.net/tardis
and in the absence of a physical haynes manual type book version answers some of the questions I had anyway.
THe haynes manuals now include a sci fi series including several craft from both Start Trek and Star Wars as well as Thunderbirds and a couple of other famous fantasy tropes.
https://haynes.co.uk/catalog/general-interest-manuals/sci-fi/imperial-death-star-manual
Would love something physical like that since I tend to read that type of thing in locations other than where my computer is.

I'm still wondering how 'real' an object that seems real to the touch in an infinite array of different sizes and shapes can be if its interior is elsewhere in as much as being in a different dimension can be.

11 Questions Every Doctor Who Fan Has Asked answered by Steven Moffat
http://www.buzzfeed.com/kmallikarjuna/questions-every-doctor-who-fan-has-answered-by-moffat#.cqdv3Moo5m

since its going around today and i don't think it's been up here so far.

those may be the least amusing gifs I've ever seen

It's... possible that was not their intent?

rushomancy for some reason I thought that was one of the stories with missing eps but will concede this joke attempt is not as amusing as whenever old clips of the show are aired on screens, holograms etc. in show anyway.

The scene with the Beatles is removed from US DVDs of The Chase but not UK; s'what I thought you meant

By the way, I'm assuming what's going to happen re: Clara is that the Doctor will try to kill young Davros in the past to save Clara from being exterminated in the present, but will not be able to, and Clara will then say 'No, I'll agree to be exterminated so that you can avoid killing Davros'.

Thought that was distinctly unbobbins apart from the sense at the end that nothing had changed re Davros and the Daleks - I was more into the idea he really would die (or even the TL/Dalek hybrid actually happening - tho perhaps Missy goes on to realise this idea - plus was this really the first Davros/Misster meeting??) as it doesn't seem like he's going to appear more often from now on and will the brilliant Julian Bleach be available in another seven years?

Much better this week. Bit of a 7/Ace vibe. What happened to Snake Man at the end?

that was cool except are the ~sunglasses~ really going to be a thing because waht

It did show the sunglasses in next week's clip at the end. Hope they're not permanent do seem a tad cheesy.
Wonder if this is a permanent new look for him, hoody & all. Do like that he's keeping the Victorian look for jacket and trousers. Though the trouser bottoms do seem overly drained.

People elsewhere are trying to compare speech ability between Clara as daleks. Her just wired into one here and unconsciously being one on her initial introduction in Asylum of The Daleks. I can't remember what of the latter was heard from outside the dalek, so not sure what was filtered into dalek terms. Hadn't realised there was quite that filter system, if there previously was. Is this an attempt to retrofit independent thought into daleks for future use?

The sunglasses are a bit Poochy, David Tennanty

* The Doctor is already responsible for countless deaths, right? So why would not saving one kid in the knowledge that he'll grow up to be Space Hitler be the one thing that makes the Doctor so ashamed he wants to die?

― Tuomas, Monday, September 21, 2015 8:09 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

This was a better episode than the last one, but I'm still wondering about this... I thought it'd be revealed in this ep that the Doctor's guilt trip in the previous one was a fake-out, but apparently it was genuine? So the War Doctor (seemingly) commited a genocide of his own people and the Daleks, and yet Nine was able to live with that guilt, but here the Doctor refuses to save one kid (who's deadly situation had nothing to do with the Doctor, he simply refused to help Davros) to stop him from becoming the creator of the Daleks, and somehow that makes the Doctor feel so guilty he contemplates ending his life?

Also, it seemed the Daleks stole quite a lot of regeneration energy from the Doctor, shouldn't that mean something? Will this Doctor now have less regenerations than twelve?

Was it just version I viewed, or did this episode look incredibly murky and washed out of colour? I didn't like that at all, it made it feel like a "realistic" war movie or something, instead of sci-fi show about a time traveling alien in a police box.

lso, it seemed the Daleks stole quite a lot of regeneration energy from the Doctor, shouldn't that mean something? Will this Doctor now have less regenerations than twelve?
― Tuomas, Sunday, September 27, 2015 1:15 PM (27 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
>
yeah I wondered about that. Assuming that he has another sequence of 12 regenerations does it take outof that. Also assumes that the Doctor always has the energy for whatever regenerations he will have to go through on him at all times. & I've not seen wheter or not that's ever been made clear. Only seems to come into play when he needs to regenerate so hard to tell. Never sure if it is something inherent to him or something he needs to tap into from some other source at the time of regeneration. Or that would normally only be there to tap into when he needs to regenerate. So need to rewatch this to see what triggered his ability to have it at hand, not sure what has happened just before his hand starts glowing green other than some spiel from Davros.

In Let's Save Hitler, River was able to give the Doctor her regeneration energy at will, so at least it's established one can do that... But yeah, I didn't like that solution either, it's too much a gamebreaker, basically it should mean the Doctor can save anyone who's about to die with a wave of his hand. And yet I'll bet we'll never see him actually do that, because it'd take away from the drama.

River had only just regenerated from Mel at the time though. So it would explain that there might be excess regenerative power or that the regenerative power source could be tapped into during a finite period around that regeneration (if I'm thinking right, since i just remembered that the show takes place over a broken time period, though Mel/River as the individual might just be the focus of where the regenerative power would be. So it would go back in time with her, can't remember at what point she regenerates there though).
& I can't remember if anything has actually physically happened to the Doctor in yesterday's episode other than him having listened to Davros. & the closest regeneration is a series and an unknown time interval away.

Forgot to add that when Tennant had just regenerated he had his hand cut off and it regenerated because of this excess regenerative power around the time of the regeneration. that hand goes onto being significant in several places in Who & Torchwood after that , eventually becoming the clone that winds up with Rose.
I think the Doctor may say something about the time around the regeneration at that point, but it has been a while since I watched teh episode

sidebar for USAians who still have cable- BBCAmerica is showing Tom Baker Who stories every morning at 7am pst :D

last week I watched this on BBCAmerica for maybe the first time as first run and the video quality looked horrible; this week I went back to torrenting it early from the UK and it looked much better. Anyone else notice this?

I've seen people trying to work out if Clara in the Witch's Familiar had less control over what was being said through the dalek she was wearing than when she was first introduced as the not-consciously dalek in Asylum of The Daleks.

I don't think I'd seen the same idea that any idea of individuality was actually filtered out by the interface with the exo-skeleton. Which might indicate that there was more individuality and independence existent in individual daleks just niot getting out because their only means of expression was expressed by that interface.
Not watched Asylum of the Daleks in a while so not sure how much of that was the inner consciousness of a girl who had been transferred into a dalek and how much she was trying to express, or indeed how much was being expressed through the dalek. Or what it came out as.

last week I watched this on BBCAmerica for maybe the first time as first run and the video quality looked horrible; this week I went back to torrenting it early from the UK and it looked much better. Anyone else notice this?

― akm, Sunday, September 27, 2015 3:42 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I think this has to do with PAL v NTSC and the way HD transfers. Could be wrong though.

Wait, if it's shown repeatedly that these Daleks can fly and get on with their own bizarre, why would be NB attached form underground matter? Couldn't they just, you know, fly away?

Proofread version:

Wait, if it's shown repeatedly that the Daleks can fly and get on with their own bizness, why would being attacked from underground matter - can't they just fly away?

Yeah I thought that was a decent idea in principle but quite poorly realised - some mud comes out of some vents, then the Daleks all start spazzing out.

All in all a good episode though, even did a half decent job of convincing me that Dave Ross' motives were pure.

The snake man is a silly character, though I guess Doctor Who does have a proud tradition of unrealistic looking serpents.

The Daleks can fly, but presumably they need to get into the open first of all. In a low ceiling-ed room there's no where to escape, as it'll just fill up with goo.

Obviously many of them escaped and are presumably plotting something with Missy

I think Missy is my favourite ever Master incarnation.

i don't quite get why sludge undead daleks were so mad

I guess Daleks are always angry, and they had had no outlet for it since loosing their murder shells?

i don't get why they're attacking the other daleks though. pissed they were relegated to the sewer?

I think mostly it's just funny to watch them overflowing with goo and then exploding.

Wanted more! The exploding Dalek is the best bit in the 50th episode.

http://31.media.tumblr.com/7d4cb891984b2bdfcb234ca174bb18ff/tumblr_mwuy94VD3s1qbypg1o1_500.gif

we need a capaldi deal with it sunglasses gif

http://www.theguardian.com/music/2015/sep/28/slipknots-corey-taylor-supplies-monster-scream-to-this-weeks-doctor-who

Viewers in their millions deserted Doctor Who as it returned to BBC One for a new series, according to overnight figures.

― Cosmic Slop, Monday, September 21, 2015 1:35 AM (1 week ago)

Aw, dammit. NO MORE SEXY DOCTORS

― I Am Curious (Dolezal) (DJP), Monday, September 21, 2015 2:01 AM (1 week ago)

bound to be if ratings dont pick up

― Cosmic Slop, Monday, September 21, 2015 2:04 AM (1 week ago)

On finals, this turned out to be .4 million down on last series' average, be the fourth-highest BBC programme for the entire week, place somewhere from 11th to 13th most-watched programme in the entire country for the week, and get an additional 1.3 million on iPlayer that isn't counted by BARB.

Cosmic Slop is thus saying that the BBC would sack Capaldi midstream and pay him out of the next year of his contract because this show was only the 11th-highest-rated show of the week. If you have a look at how many of the 12th-to-400th top programmes of the week routinely fire their sole recurring leads for, effectively, not being live competition shows and choosing their own airtime, you can probably put any future ratings handwringing ITT in perspective before it happens.

lol

whew i was worried

Rugby World Cup biting into the figures somewhat as well, I'd guess. Just on social media, I'm noticing otherwise-sane people professing to enjoy it, while sitting here being slowly traumatised by the animated advert of giant, silent England rugby players* walking through a town.

*If these were the RTD years, you could virtually guarantee that giant, silent rugby players FROM SPACE would be the Aliums of the Week.

I still agree with DJP

my comment really should be read as more of a truism than anything else

sexy Doctors ruin everything

i like all the doctors in nu-who tbh. Its shitty stories ruin everything

but yeah capaldi is my fave now

Moffat should've persisted with the nu-Daleks. Everyone may predictably and boringly think they look stupid but bearing in mind this ep actually bothered to include the utterly rubbish-looking Battle/Special Weapons Dalek in a few shots I think a better excuse for this backdown is required (a Dalek civil war between them and all the rest might be fun).

Aw I like the special weapons Dalek.

Special Weapons Dalek rules, and is utterly terrifying in the novel

there are p much always Dalek Civil Wars going on

This was fun. For a second I thought they would do more with the Clara Dalek, possibly leaving her to be trapped and rescued by the Doctor at another time (was that a 11th Doctor story?) but I guess it would make him look a bit stupid and we can't have that.

Davros really worked those acting chops. If the Daleks ever get tired of exterminating he should go in for line reads.

Part 2 redeemed part 1, particularly with all of the Doctor/Davros double-crossing and Clara getting stuck in a Dalek

Also... Clara seems better suited to be paired with Missy than either incarnation of the Doctor that she's traveled with; I would watch so much of their bickering/attempts to kill each other

Very nearly as good as Jo Grant having to team up with Missy after he tries to kill her, the viewer also knowing that the next double-cross can only be an episode away

The Dalek Interface was fantastic, more Grant Morrison than Geoff Johns - a brilliant idea that you'd imagine the regular staff would grumble about having to fit in next time.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/doctorwho/entries/953c5b1f-3cc8-4db9-8184-f1b6567260f1
Spin off to be filmed next year. Set in Coal Hill school, so i'm wondering if this si the class that we've already met.
Also just occurring to me that since Clara is teaching there she might just be moving onto this, don't know though. NOt exactly going to be sad to see her go anyway.

The Dalek Interface was fantastic, more Grant Morrison than Geoff Johns

is this a Titan comic or...?

I'm assuming that dalek interface is either the suit/casing filtering what can be said by the individual dalek or the wiring going straight into the lobes. Is the latter the cause of the former? Not having direct input from all parts of the brain? &having what input was coming filtering through the parts directly connected to?
I can't remember the supposed layout of the brain as to movement, creativity, language etc or is that getting too close to phrenology.

Anyway people on other lists were wondering if there had been a change in the interface since Clara's first appearance in Asylum of the Daleks. Was the souffle bit totally internal or something she was able to express through the suit.
Does the Witch's Familiar allow for more of an intermal dalek life than just thinking of hate and extermination. Though long term wear would probably lead to very blinkered/brainwashed thought. As would coming from the culture.
How does the nature vs nurture argument work with dalek upbringing?

Maybe the spinoff will feature Martha, the Coal Hill student who appeared in a few episodes last season? I thought she was pretty cool, was disappointed we didn't see her after "Kill the Moon".

Courtney was the student.

I noticed that Clara was encased in the only non-glowy Dalek, and the camera lingered on the non-glow very pointedly. Still, she could've had a dose of Dalek cooties to become what Missy called 'the enemy inside the friend'. We shall see.

I think its her class that's in the Woods with the Doctor in that episode where the trees pop up over night so that is the same class I was referring to. I don't think much is known at the moment beyond that.
Other than writer is Philip Ness and it's supposed to9 fit a niche about halfway between Sarah Jane Adventures and Torchwood.

From Radio Times, which I'm assumimng is still a pretty central if not the immediate source
http://www.radiotimes.com/news/2015-10-01/11-questions-and-some-answers-about-doctor-who-spin-off-class

That wasn't Courtney's class; IIRC those kids were several years younger.

Right, haven't rewatched it yet.
THought they had established a class. Possibly the one that Clara mainly taught.
Since it doesn't film until next year it may be more likely that it would bea younger class. But not sure what they're thinking.
Author is normally Young Adult, but programme might want to have the possibility of following a certain bunch of kids over a longer period? Obviously if it merely covers pupils from a school it could be covering several forms, though the singular class of the title might make that unlikely.
Things will be revealed next year I guess.

Meanwhile I might get around to watching that episode again.

assuming that dalek interface is either the suit/casing filtering what can be said by the individual dalek or the wiring going straight into the lobes

Can't see that either of these would be a problem for "the regular staff" to fit in next time: propsmasters didn't even have the lobe thingies showing in the "same" (obv a different casing) Dalek when Missy fished the Kaled/clone out, and Briggs has done every Dalek voice in nu-Who already, including Clara and Oswin, so if there's any internal conflict to try and act, it'd be the same process as here. AFAIK he even goes to the readthroughs - he's talked about getting recognised by supernerd Capaldi at their first meeting.

If Andrew wasn't talking about a comic idg the Johns comparison though - we saw Davros with his arm ripped off!

What does Briggs voicing have to do with the clear point being made that Clara cannot express certain things through the Dalek suit? Any show of individuality for one thing. She is quite clearly shown saying I'm Clara or whatever the phrasing she uses is and it coming out as 'I am A Dalek.'
That is the point that people who watched the show The Witch's Familiar have been making. & it's to what extent the external casing of a dalek prohibits any show of individuality or emotion other than hate. & I know a lot of people noted that because they said so.

So there is no relevance whatsoever to whether Capaldi recognises the actor doing dalek voices. The dalek voice is unlikely to be used to say any of that stuff since the dalek module edits that out subsequently its not going to be in the script he is reading.

Did you watch the show?

Also going back to what you said last week, what Hartnell says to Ian Chesterton about the relationship between the outside of the Tardis and the inside is a very vague metaphor. It's basic technobabble not any kind of explanation.
The Tardis developed massively over the Classic era it also changed pretty heavily, the console room changes pretty randomly and what's beyond that isn't defined.

a niche about halfway between Sarah Jane Adventures and Torchwood.

Those are quite some distance apart.

a niche about halfway between Sarah Jane Adventures and Torchwood.

This would be occupied by a programme called Doctor Who.

I think the source of that comment says something similar.
Could just be that Dr Who isn't broadcast all the time during the year.
Also that there is possibly more scope for a writer to develop new characters. There's an article talking more about the school that I haven't read yet. Might say more there. Think the link's from that 11 questions RT thing.

What does Briggs voicing have to do with the clear point being made that Clara cannot express certain things through the Dalek suit?

Clara is a fictional character; Briggs is a freelance actor, but the most regular one the show has employed*. Clara, being fictional is not part of "the regular staff." Briggs is not formal "staff," but at least as regular as the props and design people who work from one Dalek story to the next.

Any show of individuality for one thing. She is quite clearly shown saying I'm Clara or whatever the phrasing she uses is and it coming out as 'I am A Dalek.'

It's true, this is something that happened in a fictional TV show. It doesn't relate to whether the crew would include two wires in a prop the next time an equivalent prop appears, which is what you were theorising.

That is the point that people who watched the show The Witch's Familiar have been making. & it's to what extent the external casing of a dalek prohibits any show of individuality or emotion other than hate. & I know a lot of people noted that because they said so.

This is about the fourth time you have brought up vague references to things people on other parts of the internet are theorising about what made-up hatemonsters inside war tanks might personally feel inside their war tanks. Which is obviously a fun thing to do if one is into that, but you telling us over and over again that some other people are wondering it and you know they are because they said so a) doesn't have much more effect that saying it once, and b) is completely irrelevant to whether or not the regular staff on the show will include two wires in a prop next time, or the actor voicing the war tanks will struggle to include resultant angst in his performance.

(NB we still dunno what Andrew actually meant! These two are just your surmises.)

I also referenced the only internal monologue of a Dalek I can remember upthread btw - Aaronovitch's novelisation of Remembrance.

So there is no relevance whatsoever to whether Capaldi recognises the actor doing dalek voices.

It was only speaking to Briggs' possible honorary claim to being part of "the regular staff," and being a really cute fact.

The dalek voice is unlikely to be used to say any of that stuff since the dalek module edits that out subsequently its not going to be in the script he is reading.

Okay, so you've eliminated that from one of your two suggestions as to what The Dalek Interface might be, and are now just going with the two lobey wires. Andrew could probably pop back sometime and just say what he meant, though!

Did you watch the show?

Three times!

Also going back to what you said last week, what Hartnell says to Ian Chesterton about the relationship between the outside of the Tardis and the inside is a very vague metaphor. It's basic technobabble not any kind of explanation.

..............you're getting there!

The Tardis developed massively over the Classic era it also changed pretty heavily, the console room changes pretty randomly and what's beyond that isn't defined.

You're really getting there!

(The TARDIS is COMPLETELY MADE UP AND IMAGINARY AND IMPOSSIBLE. As you note, what it can do changes all the time depending on the writer, so there cannot be any rules or graphs or schematics. A charming metaphor about television is the best and only explanation there can ever be.)

you two need a tv show

Haha yes or at least a podcast please.

I thought it was long since established that dalek emotions were genetically engineered out, which would mean the casing isn't doing any filtering exactly, but that it's just not up to the task of conveying anything outside what daleks are able to think/feel in the first place.

THere seemed to be some revision of that. The idea that mercy was included in the dalek vocabulary triggered some thought during the programme. It seemed to be the reason why the Doctor went back and actually saved the young Davros instead of just leaving him there as he appears to have done at the start of the programme.
Wondering if Davros having hung onto a sonic screwdriver until it's returned by the snake guy indicated a change in the timeline where the doctor initially left the boy he'd discovered was davros in the handmine field only returns to save him because he's heard the dalek being able to say 'mercy' instead of it being edited out by the casing.
Find it odd that the name Davros is totally unique though.

Or was the Doctor about to give up the sonic screwdriver anyway because he thought Ray bans would be so much more useful? Wonder how long those will last? Liits ability to see in lowered light levels surely?

thought it was long since established that dalek emotions were genetically engineered out

It's also long since established that Daleks cannot move outside their city because they run on static electricity, like dodgem cars. Pretty much every Dalek story makes something new up, with little regard as to whether it adds to or contradicts past Dalek lore. (And Terry Nation, when he actually wrote the scripts he was credited with, was by FAR the least arsed about keeping anything straight from one story, year, or decade to the next.)

They're v often shown as feeling hate though (other times a cold imperative of domination), frequently shown as feeling fear (sometimes as a deliberate contrast to their claims of emotionlessness, sometimes just for the scene's drama), and actively breeding or engineering certain emotions or a humanlike capacity for feeling back into them has been a major plot point in 1960s stories, 1980s stories, and 2000s stories, off the top of my head.

I can't help but feel in some way responsible...

All I meant by Morrison vs Johns was hotshot idea fountain vs person in charge of continuity. A better comparison might be Darin Morgan? He wrote a few episodes of the X-Files, for which his brother was a producer. One of the episodes established that Men In Black were capable of completely implanting any idea into the head of the impressionable, to the point of leaving them with intentionally ridiculous memories such as being visited by Alex Trebek and Jesse Ventura. This worked incredibly well in the episode, which is one of the series best - but it meant that every other episode had to ignore it.

So, it's odd to see it from the head man, is what I was trying to get at.

I think its the cybermen that intentionally rejected emotion, at least in the early parts of the classic era. Think that has remained pretty consistent though and is part of what an upgrade is about.

The previous Oswald in a Dalejk adventure Asylum of the daleks has her, or presumably some type of prototype relative of hers called Oswin Oswald crashland on the Asylum planet and get a full transformation to being a dalek. I'm not sure fi that is a widespread practise or talked about elsewhere, but it would certainly mean that she couldn't have emotions genetically bred out of her. & if there is an element of the dalek force taht is other lifeforms coverted to daleks it would presumably be true of them too.
She's calleda genius there which could be why they don't manage to fully remove her personality. Not sure fi clara is thought of as being as bright.
Also not sure how Oswin and Clara are supposed to be interrelated other tahn being played by the same actress with some of the same characteristics, an element of bossiness and supposed flirtation that I think falls pretty flat.Not sure fi this was going to be a repeat character at the time, if she somehow proved popular with the audience who wante d to see more of her or if this was just the try out for an existing future character. It's still Ponds era, though they appear to have been rowing or something and make up noticeably during the show.

Looks like show conitinuity is still as haphazard as it was in the pre home vcr era when it wasn't thought that anybody would be watching anything more than once so wouldn't be keeping tabs on things. Which has me wondering what canon is really, seems to be something that a lot of people talk about while others dismiss its existence.
It could be purposefully vague and since it is something that has more organically accumulated over half a century than been created from one source as Star Wars or Star Trek were it probably will continue to change?

I'd still really like a Haynes manual type book with the layout of the Tardis in, have had a chance to look at the Millenium Falcon volume and would love a chance to look at something like that based on the series. Surprised something like that doesn't exist if it doesn't already. Cross sections of Tardis, dalek, sonic screwdriver etc. I have something similar based on Gerry Anderson serieses that I picked up from FOPP cheaply.

Will be interested to find out what the new series The Class has to offer. News on that only came out on Friday night so little is known so far.

Great episode today. Story a bit derivative, sure, but there hasn't been a base story this polished and fun for a while (compare that dreadful submarine episode from a few seasons back).

Background music noticeably more subdued too - someone new?

I loved this

man that was tight & intriguing! can't wait for next week

(sidebarthey really are sticking with the sunglasses huh...)

They did only turn up last week so are still a novelty. Doesn't necessarily mean they'll stick with them. Somebody said there's a photo of him wearing them at UNIT from later in the series too. It looks like they have the bonus of transmitting images too.
But I do like the handheld screwdriver so hope he finds he needs it.

Yes, this was A+ rolled-gold Who. Every second Whithouse episode has been fantastic so far - hopefully next week bucks the pattern, but even falling to the level of his others wouldn't be too bad.

Background music noticeably more subdued too - someone new?

Every single episode of nu-Who has been Murray Gold.

Also not sure how Oswin and Clara are supposed to be interrelated other tahn being played by the same actress with some of the same characteristics, an element of bossiness and supposed flirtation that I think falls pretty flat.Not sure fi this was going to be a repeat character at the time, if she somehow proved popular with the audience who wante d to see more of her or if this was just the try out for an existing future character.

...this is the entire running plot of the next eight episodes after the Ponds leave, four episodes later.

I'd still really like a Haynes manual type book with the layout of the Tardis in,

There is no layout of the TARDIS. Even in the fictional world, it is endlessly changeable. If you draw one yourself, it will be exactly as valid as one you bought in a shop, if one existed. You could just commission the guy that drew the cover on deviantART that makes you wish this to do you as many pictures as you want to see.

Doctor Who has never worked as a sci-fi franchise with rules and maps to learn and cherish, the way people do with Star Trek and Star Wars. It tells stories in different worlds and settings and genres and styles - if you want more TARDIS than you got from watching every single episode in a row, you could read Changes by Grant Morrison and Cat's Cradle by Platt and (iirc) Timewyrm: Revelation by Cornell and Christmas On A Rational Planet by Lawrence Miles etc etc, but you do seem more interested in rules than stories?

Teatime Brutality's essay on canon remains both excellent and relevant: http://teatimebrutality.blogspot.ca/2009/07/canon-and-sheep-shit-why-we-fight.html

I love doctor who when he actually tests theories when he doesn't know what's going on. Not enough sci-fi TESTS stuff!

Every second alternate Whithouse episode

Would like to see more like this
http://inspector97.deviantart.com/art/Tardis-Type-40-Mark-I-001-160444012
http://inspector97.deviantart.com/art/Tardis-Type-40-Mark-I-001-163806778
http://inspector97.deviantart.com/art/Typical-TARDIS-X-Section-71275168

since they do exist. There are also a number of designs from the production itself.
I have known of the existence of these for a while and assumed that if there was such a thing as a Haynes manual based on the Tardis in print they would be the content. I had seen the book cover in isolation from what i assumed to be content, I've now seen why.

& I personally would like a book of that kind of thing to peruse at leisure. Maybe somebody else wouldn't. Do I care what the other individual wants? Probably not very much.

As to the current story. One thing i though a bit iffy was that set of cards taht Clara had set up for teh Doctor to appear more human by. Was that the thinking behind it.

I do enjoy the stories in the show, at least when they're good, I also do like to know how details are supposed to work. That might make me a bit different to another individual, everybody has different requirements of a lot of things. Tends to be the way the world works. I think it has been a theme used in the show several times.

http://pre01.deviantart.net/840b/th/pre/i/2010/145/2/5/tardis__type_40_mark_i_001_by_time_lord_rassilon.png

http://pre05.deviantart.net/39f7/th/pre/i/2010/127/9/7/tardis__type_40_mark_i_001_by_time_lord_rassilon.png
http://pre03.deviantart.net/34d8/th/pre/i/2010/147/a/b/tardis__type_40_mark_i_003_r_by_time_lord_rassilon.png

there is also the Steve Tribe book Doctor Who :The Tardis Handbook
http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/1846079861?keywords=tardis%20handbook&qid=1443920508&ref_=sr_1_1&sr=8-1
which I'd somehow overlooked.

http://www.radiotimes.com/news/2015-10-04/doctor-who-fans-have-launched-an-online-campaign-to-bring-back-the-sonic-screwdriver
as I'm sure all right thinking who fans will be glad to discover, somebody has started a petition to have the sonic screwdriver returned to the show

Did not like pac man reference

Did like sign language character

That might make me a bit different to another individual, everybody has different requirements of a lot of things. Tends to be the way the world works. I think it has been a theme used in the show several times.

Dude, I'm trying to be helpful: those are all better stories than (the TV version of) Invasion Of Time and much much better than Journey To The Centre.

didn't even catch the pac man reference until i read that, that's fairly clever actually. I liked this episode a lot, for a corridor-driven old school DW story.

I was thinking more of Alien3 at the beginning of that chase through the tunnels sequence but will probably rewatch some time this week.

Yes more like this please.

Whithouse clearly being groomed as Moffat's successor imo.

I kinda hope they do get rid of the sonic shades and replace them with a sonic iPhone which requires the Doctor to constantly take sonic selfies.

Whithouse clearly being groomed as Moffat's successor imo.

He's been denying this since Moffat's second year, repeatedly saying that the BBC have never even approached him about the possibility and that these conversations are something that take place only in the heads of fans.

I thiiiiiiiink the sonic shades are probably a temporary thing, and there'll be a plot reason besides 'Davros still has the sonic screwdriver'.

Google Glass tie-in

At the end of that story, had Davros actually had the screwdriver or was that a different timeline?

& anyway why isn't Clara showing signs of pregnancy with the ancestors of Orson Pink? Is he now in a different timeline too?

Some messaging service if the ghosts aren't actually audible.

Two stories in a row where the Doctor's life is in imminent danger -- sensing a theme here, he's the nu-Rory.

Poor Rory.

In fairness, the Doctor's life should be in imminent danger in every story

To be more precise, he was supposed to die in the first two-parter (his testament), and now his ghost.

& anyway why isn't Clara showing signs of pregnancy with the ancestors of Orson Pink? Is he now in a different timeline too?

There was never any implication Orson was necessarily related Clara, was there? Danny could've impregnated someone else before she met her.

Orson talked about a family story of a timetravelling grandparent or great-grandparent which would imply her more than Danny, who didn't time travel. Or if it didn't imply her it would talk of a great amount of chance that he met 2 different time travelling women.
It was something people were asking about elsewhere a couple of days ago.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/reehines/2015/10/05/doctor-who-showrunner-steven-moffat-trolls-incredibly-irate-fans-with-sonic-sunglasses/

http://www.warpedfactor.com/2015/10/doctor-who-next-companion-nut-c.html

oh moffpaws

what was the pacman thing?

Yes, was it just that they were chasing ghosts? Or a more specific reference?

I assume also that the day/night switch is like when you eat a power pill? Except not.

I loved this episode - a lot of it, particularly the fact finding after the ghosts are trapped, reminded me a lot of McCoy, greater praise than which does not exist. Up to "I want to kiss it to death", at least.

Very briefly confused at the Company Man's resemblance to John Simm, though.

Very briefly confused at the Company Man's resemblance to John Simm, though.

Well there was a conspicuous absence of Missy.

BTW, how do we know that the ghost we saw in the cliffhanger was the Doctorb? Maybe it was that Roman fella, or Frobisher, and now we can finally put Rusty's fanwank to rest.

Yes, that path definitely leads to less fanwank.

Missy stuff
http://www.bbcamerica.com/doctor-who/videos/michelle-gomez-3-questions-2-biscuits-and-1-cuppa-tea/

http://www.cultbox.co.uk/features/opinion/should-missy-have-her-own-doctor-who-spin-off-series

this was a pretty great episode, except they need to tone down the "let's have adventures! I love doing this so much!" stuff as it is treacly yet leaden. (they're not going to do this)

i enjoyed this! but multiple timeline storylines hurt my brane

Did anyone else feel like there were some great ingredients here which were put together very badly?

The flooded village, the alien entombed in it, digging up a spaceship from a flooded village, being trapped in tunnels chased by ghosts - all right and proper but the story had no weight

And I'm not totally sure about this, but the timeline hopping, and it being a problem but then not being a problem, really pissed me off, not because I'm expecting (or would ever want) Dr Who to be about 'hard sci-fi', but because it fudged the story

Like I'm pretty sure it was never actually explained or even hammered into reasonable shape

Think we also need to do something about the phenomena of people who design CGI monsters and spaceships for TV shows being geeks, and so coming up with very derivative designs which come from other sci-fi rather than from outside sources. The spaceship in this episode was an exact copy of a shuttle craft from star trek with all the inherent dullness, and I know that whoever designed the alien knows what a Genestealer Patriarch is, put it that way.

If they're going to break the creepy atmosphere with shoddy pacing and then show us the monsters anyway they could at least bother to come up with something distinctive and specific to this story. Not saying the Robots in Robots of Death were particularly convincing, but considering they were prob knocked up in about a week they at least did their 'job' well in terms of design:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/staticarchive/ba4a076f7faf251cf5470ae0110a4e4a1c4caca9.jpg

ugh i love the robots of death

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eyD5ILDvYho

Thought both episodes were pretty terrific; fave Capaldi story so far.

The Doctor never died! He didn't change the future -- the future informed him in the past to put the future into motion.

given multiple stories in the past have used the bootstrap paradox rather more elegantly (blink, time crash, etc), the whole hammering home of it wasn't really needed or clever

were they actually fourth-wall breaking in the beginning or was he supposed to be talking to clara or something.

enjoyed when i figured out who was supposed to be in the coffin before it opened (as i'm sure everyone else did, but nonetheless). didn't enjoy the tedious explaining of just how he did it in the end with lots of exposition making up for good storytelling.

honestly i appreciated it bcz i was confused :)

sure, i think it would have been confusing without it. but imho that means they didn't do enough work to make it clear in better ways than a huge chunk of dialogue all at the end.

Agreed, but that huge chunk of inelegant dialogue (plus the opening) was still pretty entertaining - think the story would've been a bit dour without them

Yeah Beethoven thing was good, is that a longstanding paradox example?

I see the sunglasses are getting wider use, might have some people worried they might take on same deus ex machina status as screwdriver. I noticed the arms actually got used asa screwdriver at one point too.

Haven't rewatched this yet. Think there were a few other things that struck me at the time that will come back to me later.

Really enjoying Capaldi so hope he does get to stick around for a while. Do prefer him with his hair getting longer, certainly than it was through much of the first season. Not really taken by the hoody but glad he's keeping long coat, though do hope he favors more of a frock coat than a crombie. Have we seen the dark maroon jacket in the series yet? Certainly seen photos of it elsewhere.
& tartan trousers are cool and very b=w Doctors so hope we see more of those. Has he been wearing the holy top that he wore in the first series again? Thought i saw it in a couple of shots.

The standard example of that paradox is probably Back to the Future:)

I don't think the Sonic Screwdriver's been used as a DEM much - it's pretty much always been a magic wand.

I liked Clara with 12 last season but this season has felt even better so far. I am buying the idea that she is filling the void left by Danny's death with dangerous adventures and that the Doctor is beginning to become concerned about it. I am also buying hardcore Capaldi's Doctor as an incarnation who cares very deeply about the big picture to the point where details pass him by.

The ax scene approached "Flatline" levels of terrifying.

The standard example of the bootstrap paradox is probably "...By His Bootstraps."

Radio Times thing on the easter eggs scattered through the show (episode 4 specifically)
http://www.radiotimes.com/news/2015-10-12/how-many-of-these-doctor-who-and-other-sci-fi-references-did-you-spot-in-before-the-flood

The bootstrap paradox people of my age and UK sci-fi bent might have been first exposed to…

http://www.2000ad.org/functions/cover.php?Comic=2000ad&choice=303

any younger… maybe Gary Sparrow in Goodnight Sweetheart coming up with Beatles songs. (LOL)

I'm not sure Who has had a bootstrap paradox before. I think there's been paradoxical objects, and timey-wimey causality - but not 'who came up with the idea' loops.

I think there's a feeling of being robbed in this story if you think about it too much. Like if you worked out the problem, and how to fix them, there are probably short cuts, like a quick time-travel phone call, that would sort it out. But when you are presented with 'these are the facts in the future' then the protagonists have to do whatever to fix the phenomena in the past. So the plot is retro-fitted, and that feels like a cheat. But it was fun getting there.

Anyone think there is a Peter Serofinowicz out-take of him screaming "OOOOH SHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII…" at the flood?

boo to no link pictures. It's this http://www.2000ad.org/functions/cover.php?Comic=2000ad&choice=303

Hah, The Shakespeare Code was rotten with them - Doctor and Martha quoting things at him that he hadn't written yet.

http://www.2000ad.org/covers/2000ad/hires/303.jpg ?

That clip from Bad Wolf has made me really want another few series of Ecclestone, now.

That's the one.

And GPWM re Shakespeare Code. Also now I think of it, OldRoberts also did similar with Agatha Christie

all this reminds me… final final final ep of Continuum…

First part was way better, still enjoyed it fine. The Fisher King looked a bit rubbish and cobbled together after all that build up.

Was it implied that there could be unforeseen consequences as a result of the Doctor creating the time paradox? That was the impression I got but I may be reading too much into things.

No it was all fine, because while the Doctor may have been messing around with TIME, the Fisher King had been messing around with LIFE, the Doctor decided

My only quibble is that this is the second time the Doctor has used that loophole resolution under Moffatt's reign (see: The Wedding of River Song)

There was the stuff with the Pandorica too right?

I thought very hard about this season for some time today. My colleagues were discussing episode details and I went off on an internal tangent about what the arc and the twist might be for this year. Ideas:

1. This season is about breaking the rules and the consequences. He's already gone back and fucked with Davros' timeline, and now he's bootstrapped, with much sturm und drang in both cases. Both times to save the companion who keeps acting more and more like him, and not always in a good way.

2. Genocide as a theme stronger than ever.

3. Oh he's going to have to purposefully blow up Gallifrey again to save the rest of the universe. Just get it over with, fuck.

Moffat better be working on his succession plan. I love Capaldi though, would be really excited if they get him a companion that works. I'm not a Clara hater at all, I just think Capaldi's doctor needs new help with a fresh arc, stat.

Hope they do a historical with T.S. Eliot this season.

HURRY UP PLEASE IT'S TIME

he do the police box in different bodies

In 33 years, I have watched episodes on same-day to six-months-or-more delay in Australia, on VHS off-air for catchup, on decades/years/days-later repeat, on 16mm projection, on BBC VHS and DVD, on t0rr3ntz, on couple-of-hours delay in Australian cinema, on within-the-hour-of-UK-TX legal streaming, days or weeks before UK TX for professional reasons, almost-simulcast-except-for-introductory-skits in a UK cinema... and tonight I watched an episode on UK telly as it went to air, for the first time ever.

Turns out I'm really good at it.

http://i4.photobucket.com/albums/y115/kitbrash/wdyll/kit_who-emmy_zpsvuj1udby.jpg

i hate u and I'm jealous and yay!

Nice!

I don't suppose this 'choosing my face for a later regeneration based on someone I saved when I wasn't supposed to' thing will lead to another Tom Baker appearance but I don't see much value in it otherwise - can't see a satisfactory explanation for why their faces over countless others saved/unsaved including all the women.

It proves that the Doctor chose Maxil's face to remind him to be a supercilious prick

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-OLt6NL1UsHk/UkYlCTSmL1I/AAAAAAAABxU/qaVSCH4qKOY/s1600/vlcsnap-2013-09-28-09h35m31s121.jpg

btw I was also watching with this kid

I thought he chose that face because that was the successful actor who managed to get the job. & because he wasa good one he'd already made an appearance in the show.
Is it only Capaldi and Colin Baker who had appeared in the show previous to them becoming the doctor oh & Mrs Richard Dawkins who consciously took the face of a princess she'd met.

& will Capaldi also have to explain why he popped up in Torchwood?

Meanwhile, wonder if there's any mileage in watching Maisie's 800 year lifepath between storylines as a spin off show possibility?
Unlikely to be followed since she will probably be busy with Game of Thrones but might be an idea worth following with somebody.
I've seen people elsewhere suggest that she might be the hybrid that Davros is talking about. Not sure where the nanotechnology that saves her came from and do need to watch the program again since I was doing something else when it started.

Or to put it another way, the Doctor has just put an immortal character into Earth history so I wonder if there is any likelihood that further stories about her would be something worth looking into as spinoff material. Is she likely to warrant further following in Big Finish or anything? Or is her uneventful life going to be explained in next week's episode?

Also realising the significance of the dialogue in the pre-series show trailer. Since the doctor presumably won't have seen her in 700 odd years and maybe hasn't kept track of her. But how that fits into shown timeline will be shown next week.

i.e. the clip with him going 'You' or whatever it was he said.

That was pretty default Doctor Who - pretty lame but with some good and funny bits here and there.

Nice gloomy ending too, shame it was undercut a bit by the Carry On Dickery of the next week preview.

Meanwhile, wonder if there's any mileage in watching Maisie's 800 year lifepath between storylines as a spin off show possibility?

This is being done as a spin-off BBC book of short stories

Is it only Capaldi and Colin Baker who had appeared in the show previous to them becoming the doctor oh & Mrs Richard Dawkins who consciously took the face of a princess she'd met.

And of course Martha and Amy both appeared earlier as other people, as did Gwen from Torchwood

If we're doing companions, there's the Brigadier. Benton too, but you couldn't tell. Barbara came back after 15 years in another role. Sara Kingdom came back 25 years later, as a villain.

Plus a bunch of non-regulars I listed last time we did this.

Yes, sorry, I was just doing nu-Who ones, since before Martha/Gwen nobody felt the need to explain the reuse of actors in-story

http://twitter.com/jonnymorris1973/status/655770867234971649

Well acted and some funny dialogue, but pretty average plot-wise.

was kind of hoping they were setting her up to be the next companion (suppose that could still happen).

Think she's too big a star for that, plus full time GoT commitments for the next x number of years.

I'm still holding out for the big reveal that she ends up being Katryca from The Mysterious Planet. It could happen.

I missed hearing anything said about the Mire or however its spelt having the necessary nanotechnology as part of the ir standard equipment that it could be reconfigured to allow for humanoid immortality. Also missed the point where the Doctor did the reconfiguration to allow a human female to survive on Mire nanotechnology. I assume both were in there.
JUst being reminded of the Empty Child where an alien nanotechnology totally misunderstands what constitutes a normal human and tries to reconfigure everything to fits its initial miscomprehension.

Wondering what the symbiotic state that imposed nanotechnology would keep a human in. Since he configured it at speed, or at l;east i presume so since it must have been in the space fo a few hours at longest, did the Doctor take in the menstrual cycle, pregnancy or any peak or trough state like love, sexual ecstacy or anything? & if not won't she be limited in what she can feel over teh centuries.
Do hope she hasn't been left belicose and with a nasty overbite as a result of where the technology came from.

I am not sure that Doctor Who is in the business of telling stories about the problems immortal adolescent females have with their alien-modified periods. I could be wrong but I don't think that's actually in their remit.

O_o

Just thinking of a few things that an alien technology might not recognise as normal for a human body. She probably wouldn't be able to get drunk or stoned either. & 700 years or whatever it is, possibly eternity, with that being fixed every time its underway might be a pain.

Baroque

There were some clunking historical inaccuracies (he said blunderbuss and it was a flintlock, no 'cocktails' surely in 1600s) and was that rufus hound as the other highwayman and the lion-man was crap should have just hinted at the lion like qualities without being so explicit

Apart from all that though loved the camera work and locations and costumes and soliloquies from Maisie/Lady Me

yes https://twitter.com/rufushound

re earlier chat on companion actors re-appearing, Ian Marter (Harry Sullivan) also appeared in Carnival of Monsters

What I didn't like is they seem to be setting up to kill off Clara in a GoT sort of way which if it does go that way is a load of bs

re earlier chat on companion actors re-appearing

Peter Purves impressed the production so much that he returned as a different character and became a companion weeks later, in the same story

So looks like Ashildr had the capacity to have children, but gave up after the Black Death. What's that 300 odd years since her own initial time?

Also looks like she's coming back in episode 10 from news I saw elsewhere. Hope it's not her last appaearance, though it is the end of the current series, unless you count the Xmas edition. Supposed to be something about aliens living in hidden parts of london or something.

So does that mean that Maisie Williams is a Who fan I wonder. I think she would have made a good companion.
End of the show sounded daunting re Carla.

THough next episode is the OSgood one. The Zygone revolution.

When Capaldi was riding on the horse, his shaggier gray hair and his coat with red lining gave me incredibly strong Pertwee feelings.

Didn't like how quickly Arya rediscovered her compassion -- felt undeveloped to me. Did like the dialogue she had w/ the Doctor at the end.

The sunglasses are clearly 12's version of "bowties are cool."

Also looks like she's coming back in episode 10 from news I saw elsewhere.

I've kept quiet throughout this year's thread but for FUCK's sake can people stop posting spoilers, trailers, casting news and upcoming plot points? idk why this year has suddenly changed but

if any mods are reading this, deleting that whole post would be nice

I read that in the Radio times a few days back, I think that is a pretty official source so I don't see why I can't mention it. It is already being circulated. It was obviously out before I posted

Other points i make in the above message were in the episode itself and from the ending trailer. I thought we were allowed to talk about events in the episode that had been shown.

Are you inventing new rules for everybody?

"It is already being circulated. It was obviously out before I posted." are shit rationalisations, for the record - Radio Times fair enough though.

We went through this a few years ago.

These threads have always been as spoiler-free as possible

Are you inventing new rules for everybody?

I'm reiterating the guidelines that everyone discussed and voted on and agreed several years ago, and went over and agreed on again a few years later. Things being printed in the Radio Times has been specifically hashed out (it's not in the show, the RT isn't published worldwide, a vanishingly small percentage of posters to the thread read it, even producers of the show have wrestled with the spoilery nature of RT coverage as far back as 1982, etc etc.) You can accuse me of making it up, fine, but I don't know what that gains when the threads are still here.

So that liony dude this week wasn't a tharil? Because he looked a lot like a tharil.

Looked like it to me.

http://www.mtv.com/news/photos/l/lolla_retrospective_020306/32.jpg

this was good

I felt a bit weird about some of her more coquettish turns & the full on grownup lady hair & whatnot felt a bit playing house but I enjoyed the ep & her monologues were great

I hope we see a lot more of her. Hope Maisie is a fan so she makes time in an already busy schedule, if GoT continues to continue, to appear in the show however frequently.

Hardly flawless, but I liked this one, a lot more interesting/unusual than the first part. Maisie was very good.

Though I was kind of enjoying the much lower than usual stakes before the obligatory alien invasion fleet came out of the sky.

Maisie Williams was incredible in this IMO.

Totally agree. Haven't seen any GoT yet so this was my first exposure to her. Very impressive.

Yeah, she's going to be huge imo.

She is so good. If you can find a d/l of a TV film called Cyberbully, she's just incredible in that.

She is absolutely on the Carey Mulligan track and I look forward to her pending Oscar nomination.

Maisie is 18 at the moment so I hope she is going to be looking forward to a long time doing interesting stuff, seems to have had a pretty good start so far.

My friend who works as an accountant for GoT has hung with her a bit and really likes her, she was nicking cigarettes off him at one of the staff parties.

Just rewatched the last one and am still feeling that Me's Highwayman costume is years too early. Looks like something more 18th century I would have thought.

Also the lion man identifies his race as leonides or something similar, so not sure if there is any connection to tharils. Looks like looking like a lion man is just a simplae idea to arrive at and that species name if I heard it right just sounds like a latinisation or Greek rather than anything else. Not sure if that was an attempt to breach between parallel universes or not, though not sure where Tharils originated, I only know that the one that is encountered was around the gateway into the pocket universe that Adric originated from

Eh, no reason why they should be connected really. The who universe is full of human-looking non-humans, so a tharil-looking non-tharil is justified.

Somebody had just asked if that was a tharil earlier was just what had me thinking about it. So probably not interconnected.

That one was basically crap, what a muddle. Quite liked evil Clara though.

Are all the stories going to be two- or multi-parters this season?

the titles seemed in indicate that

seemed TO indicate that

Enjoyed it. Didn't entirely manage to chew everything it bit off, and part 2 could fuck it all up, but was rather good.

Noticed the start of the preview for a later programme without seeing a trailer & saw somebody else comment on that so wonder if it was intentional.
Capaldi goes Travolta as he takes on official posting and disco steps his victory Vs was funny. As were underwear revalations.

I didn't really find any of the doctor's bits funny this week, one of the biggest problems.

The airplane bit was great.

I called the Clara bit and then completely forgot as the rest of the episode unfolded so it was a mild surprise followed by "oh yeah, I called that"

I'm not really into Dr Who military stories, but that was okay-ish. JLC was great as evil Clara - actual acting!

The metaphor stuff was a bit risible and poorly-thought through - ditto with "Kill the Moon". It's, er, not a great metaphor for racism if the metaphor is racist. Or at least, that's what I seemed to get: "Immigrants - they're just as bad as you expect - evil or easily swayed!"

yeah thought a couple of the revelations were a little predictable, things likely to happen if otherwise revealed situations are what they appear to be.

I heard there wasa trailer almost immediately afterward on other media so wonder why they didn't have one on terrestrial tv, did wonder if that was a BBC NI oversight or I'd just missed it until I saw somebody else who I assume was another territory comment on it.
THought it [pretty good otherwise.
Is this the last 2 parter?

JLC was great as evil Clara - actual acting!

trying to picture Justin Lee Collins as Clara

BAD TOIMES!

"Immigrants - they're just as bad as you expect - evil or easily swayed!"

Surely it was 'immigrants--the ones who aren't evil are likely to be seen as such because of the ones who are'

Is it a thing that all the people playing Zygones in actual zygone guise are male? I noticed that i didn't remember seeing anybody dressed in the alien suit be female.
Just wondering if that was just that episode or if it was a standing thing.

The Zygons have only appeared in two tv stories before, one T Baker serial and the 50th anniversary special, and I'm fairly certain they were all portrayed by men on those occasions.

was wondering about gendered Zygons (but see also Sontarans ambiguity)

otoh all the authority or empowered figures were women iirc which did feel intentional in a classic RTD way

The thing I noticed about the Zygons was that they didn't look remotely reptilian -- they strike me as giant tongues instead.

Surely it was 'immigrants--the ones who aren't evil are likely to be seen as such because of the ones who are'

Maybe but it was also "well if you go to a training camp and decide not to just kill them all on sight then you're an idiot and they'll just kill you instead because duh, they're evil".

Chuck otm, just a horribly muddled and ill considered set of parallels, which seems to be this guy's thing.

Not that this wasn't haphazardly presented, because it was, but the majority of the Zygons we encountered in this episode are radicalized ones, not moderates; in fact, the only moderates we encounter are the leaders who support the peace treaty, who are then kidnapped and executed by the radicals. As a result, it kind of makes sense that the Zygons we see come across as bad guys; their method for achieving their goals is inimical to our way of life. I still feel that the story went to some pains to make the "not all Zygons" point. There are a lot of points where we see the aftermath of people being slaughtered but not the actual slaughter itself; it's unclear as of right now if all of those people have actually been killed or not. (If so, the body count in this story is more on par with a Torchwood story than practically any televised Doctor Who story I can think of at the moment.) I would not be surprised if there was a bait-and-switch on some of these deaths, especially the deaths of the soldiers. (The deaths of the UNIT staff is going to be harder to handwave given the presence of evil Clara.)

So, while I definitely see the problems you guys are pointing out, I'm inclined to give the story the benefit of the doubt until I see what part 2 has to say.

Oh well yeah tbf, so am I. But my expectations are low just based on the way Kill The Moon's allegory turned out, I guess. With hindsight I think he was probably trying to make a pro-choice point with that one, but then fluffed the landing by having everyone agree that the choice made was the correct and good choice, which flipped the message around 180.

The problem with that story is that it would be really odd and counter to over 50 years of Doctor Who for the show to take the position that killing is a good thing.

You have all missed the most important thing the doctor said in the episode

The worst thing was the soldier and his troops just following his Mom into the church. Even if he thought she was real they would still ask what it was she wanted to show them all.

my wife disliked intensely the editing choice of just not showing the zygon encounter with Clara in the first bit and then showing later that it happened. this just seemed like typical 'we didn't show you' editing choices to me but she thought it was horrible. that said she watched half the episode while on her phone doing other things as usual.

The bit where the zygons came out of the church dressed up as loved ones was v effective I thought

Re the problems with the parallel: 'monsters who pretend to be normal people, who pretend to be the people we care about, and so sap our power' is such a powerful story element I fear it's going to sink any attempt at floating a 'humans and aliens can be friends' moral message on top of that. Depends a lot on part two though

er that is to say 'floating a humans and humans can be friends' moral message on top of that

(To be fair on this story though, think how many times science fiction has tried to do exactly what this prog is trying to do, and how low the success rate is ... using aliens as metaphors for Muslims or immigrants or whatever the current targeted Other group is just doesn't hold together for some reason ... Avatar was not really a compelling argument for the rights of indigenous people of the Amazon was it)

The problem with that story is that it would be really odd and counter to over 50 years of Doctor Who for the show to take the position that killing is a good thing.

Yeah of course it would. So maybe avoid writing yourself into that corner in the first place?

What corner? It was a reasonable story idea told from a perspective the show has embraced throughout the entirety of its existence; I don't think you can damn that story without also damning Genesis of the Daleks for the exact same reason, and Genesis is widely considered by fandom as a top 10 story.

The entire point of Kill the Moon had little to nothing to do with alleged pro-life propaganda and everything to do with the Doctor's alien condescension and Clara calling him on it; by that metric, I think the story is an unqualified success.

Are al the alien factions going to reconcile in the 2nd episode and let zygons be zygons?

ok lol

https://twitter.com/mrpeterharness/status/657232181803241472

Right, did surprise me that I hadn't seen it said anywhere. Thought it might just be the ending punchline or something.

WTF? Hugely positive reaction to this in my twitter on old who people I trust. But I couldn't make head or tail of it. Has this scenario played out 15 times (was it?). And each time engineered to get 2 opposites together and shouted at in a room, in a way that they won't say fuck this for a game of soldiers (sorry), and go off and carry on fighting through other means because they've already thought about this.

quite tired, so easily possibly i missed the clever bit that made sense of the resolution

I'm a bit behind and have been mostly enjoying this season in an uncommitted way but the scene with the soldier and his 'mother' on the steps of the church is probably the worst acting I can remember in nu-Who.

I thought this was fantastic top to bottom. Capaldi's speech was electrifying; also, it's heartbreaking to realize how tenuous the peace between the humans and Zygons has been given that this cycle seems to keep happening based on the throwaway comments.

I liked "London - what a dump!"

"You seem to spend a lot of time here" was a good weird self-zing although I don't suppose it will lead to them spending any less time there.

If Truth and Consequence was built into the Osgood boxes/mcguffins by the dr, is it just poetic license and coincidence that that was the flashpoint town? (And I'm still not sure which scenarios were repeated 15 times)

I did like huge parts of this, a lot was entertaining and fun fan service. But that crucial scene, that speech, the story just couldn't sustain the load, and the force of acting felt unearned, missing a fulcrum on which to turn, and i remained unmoved.

As much as I've always wanted the Dr to be able to finally TALK someone out of world domination (rather than the script using "oh and the brig has bombed them" cop out), I just found it hard to imagine Bonnie going "bollocks, you're right, fuck this, what WAS i thinking"

i realise i am mightily out of tune with consensus here. i hate missing out on the love. :-(

I thought it was a bit loud and boring this week. I fell asleep during the big speech. Starting to miss Capaldi's bastardlier Doctor from last season.

Totally And Radically Driving In Space

Osgood said there were a couple of theories as to what the acronym stood for. That was just the writer being clever and thinking the general public in the world of the story probably hadn't been told wasn't it? Rather than there ever having been an alternative to what Susan said in the 1st ever episode?
Or at least until this episode?

Almost every single reference to the acronym in the show's history has been different from what Susan said in the first episode. If there's an injoke, that's probably it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TARDIS#cite_note-3

That one was pretty good actually, the big speech was very well performed and felt genuinely resonant.

I wasn't paying a huge amount of attention at the start, how did they escape being killed by the big bazooka?

Parachute. Although you only saw two parachutes (Doctor and Osgood) so presumably everyone else died! But weren't important enough to mention.

yeah I liked this but the speech went on a bit too long, felt like they were padding things.

Doctor John Disco! Loved this ep. The speech seemed so tailored to Capaldi's strengths in the role. He's really taken over the show nicely.

^ I thought I heard that!

I wasn't paying a huge amount of attention at the start, how did they escape being killed by the big bazooka?

Clara was also able to telepathically pull Bonnie's aim to the side, so the first missile was a near-miss.

I thought clara was kind of hot as a villain.

Mostly agree, though I'd slightly tweak the syntax:

I thought clara was kind of hot.

John Disco = more of the tedious Glasgow Agenda this current production keeps shoving down our throat

We're just lucky Capaldi isn't wearing cords, Hush Puppies, a cardigan with thumb holes jammed through the cuffs, and a Postcard Records t-shirt.

I quite liked this ep & I love Capaldi's super-high intensity in that big speech

more of the tedious Glasgow Agenda this current production keeps shoving down our throat

as an American I have no frame of reference for what this could possibly mean

John Disco was in Glasgow band bis, and there used to be people moaning about a ‘Gay agenda‘ in Who.

in fairness, the only time I ever had any modicum of sympathy towards the people moaning about the Gay Agenda in Doctor Who was when reading Rusty's 7th Doctor novel Damaged Goods, which shoehorned an entirely out-of-character gay sexual encounter into a scene so that a companion's future antibodies could generate a vaccine for the HIV virus in one of the supporting characters as an uplifting coda (spoilers for a really stupid plot idea, I guess) (also the sex scene was out of character not because it's beyond the pale to think that the companion involved would ever have sex with another man but because his characterization up to that point was of a genial, happy-go-lucky police officer who was very, very focused on his police work and the sexual encounter happened in the middle of a critical stakeout that almost caused them to lose the person they were keeping tabs on; had it happened at almost literally any other point in the story, it wouldn't have been a big deal to me outside of the general tackiness of the "future fuck cures AIDS" in the first place) soooooo I can understand people being concerned when they found out Rusty was the one bringing Doctor Who back. I don't understand holding onto those concerns once the show actually started but that's another conversation.

Thought that was an okay resolution

John Disco was in Glasgow band bis

got it-- I assume Dr. Funkenstein is also some Scottish thing as well?

i kid

I read Damaged Goods for the first time last month, and was waiting for some out-of-context or -character m2m sex scene from memory of DJP grumping over the last decade here. I was amused to note how between-the-lines and in passing the backseat blowjob is (although it is indeed out of character), and amused again now that I didn't even notice a later reference to HIV immunisation.

and now that I've reminded myself, it's extra-apt for this week, given it's in a memo from The Imbecile

Really loved the last 30 seconds, future-shock-style ending, but the rest was garbage. I have hearing problems, admittedly, but this has been a very shouty, clattery season, quite hard to watch, and this was the worst so far. Next week's looks much better.

Another messy, incoherent Mark Gatiss script. I liked the first four episodes of this series; nothing since.

Yeah think I did actually fall asleep during it yesterday.
WAs pretty disappointing on first watch. May give it another shot later.

There were bits where I was wondering how corny it would look in 10 years time, then wondering if that was a further projection into the future than I needed. Was reminded of some 80s low budget stuff of Davison/MCCoy years. Then wondered fi that was an intentional tribute.

Will give this another shot and see if it improves on rewatching

Wasn't a fan of this, though as DavidM noted the last 30 seconds were p good.

I was wondering if the POV style created too much distance ... it took a while to figure out who/what that camera was and I think somewhere in there I stopped caring altogether

Sleep monsters were cool enough looking but they looked more like poo

There were moments, form me, where the Alien: Isolation-style moments of horror paid off, but the dialogue was just so naff, and the whole thing felt badly thought out overall.

I was okay with it up until they tried to make out that the monsters were made out of mucus from the eyes. That doesn't hold up. I would have been okay with 'Going in the pods makes people into monsters'. That doesn't need to hold up because it's less specific. I thought they could have used 'is there something in your eye?' at the end still, without having tried to make out that the monsters were made out of 'sleep dust'.

I liked the format, yes it was distancing and made it hard to follow though. Considering my gripe on this thread has been that the scary wasn't scary enough, they did make it nasty and scary this time around using proper horror technique (or at least trying to) so I'll raise a lighter to that.

It's a been a pretty poor season for Clara so far, given the Doc/Clara stuff was the best part of the show last year.

http://abossycontrolfreak.tumblr.com/post/132309829405/clara-hasnt-had-as-much-to-do-in-this-series-and

Hmm. Feels like they've taken a step back. Last season she was a compelling character with agency, an interesting job and an actual internal life. Now she's gone back to being a mostly passive "puzzle to solve" again. It's still *all about* Clara, but it's less fun to watch (for me, anyway). I miss the charming school stuff too.

She still has agency, but it's taken for granted now after being established last year. (The opening of last week was all about her fighting for her agency and saving the world in the process!) It's one of the great things about the Moffat era that the show has different overarching concerns each year, imo.

I enjoyed this. I don't the complaints about Clara's agency/character.

I really, really liked the POV shot concept behind the episode.

Not a Gatiss fan... till this:

I’m not a fan of crossovers, people may have picked up on this over the years. I like universes to stay separate and special, and I think the version that people have in their head is always going to trump whatever someone could come up with. Although I would love to see RuPaul’s Drag Race/Top Model mashup- it would be bloody.

They did even have the Aliens 'thup-thup-thup' movement sensor noise.

The monsters were silly in both concept and execution, like something out of Red Dwarf. Other than that I enjoyed it well enough. I quite like running around on spaceship ones.

It all felt oddly cheap, almost like a 1970s episode. The monsters looked like something from that era. Amazing the walls/doors didn't wobble.

so how is clara going to go? it seems weird they never revisited danny pink after bringing his descendant in last year. I have a feeling she will not die.

also, apparently Xmas episode brings back River Song; presumably it's the one where she first meets him.

yay!

I thought River first met the Doctor in "Let's Kill Hitler"?

oh right. oh well. I thought she said at one point he 'wasn't her doctor, her doctor was older'? I can't keep any of any of that straight.

Yes but Twelve is older than Eleven.

Or rather Eleven is older than Ten, except in appearance

Speaking of ten, I'm pretty excited about this: http://www.radiotimes.com/news/2015-11-18/keep-calm--but-weve-got-the-exclusive-first-clip-of-david-tennant-and-catherine-tates-return-to-doctor-who

;_;

It's been a great two years for debut scripts.

Actually three, as Hide was Cross' first.

Really like the way they've been trying different styles of things these last 2 series. Not everything has worked, but that's better than endless straighforward alien of the week episodes

Hope clara is dead, not because anti her or coleman, but because another reversible death would really cheapen all of that

Hope the new companion will be a good one. Not liked Clara much,
Outside of that, yesterday's show was pretty good.
Hoping that rifts between Doctor and surviving potential allies can be sorted out.
Is this a 2 or 3 parter? 12 parts to the season isn't it.
+ an Xmas special. Then nothing until Septemberish?
Do wish they'd add other seasonal specials. An Easter one would break up that interval nicely.

;_;

urgh

;_;

That was fucking great and sad and enraging and awesome and damn

I am surprised to be saying this but I'm getting "goodbye Tegan" emotional

Then nothing until Septemberish?
Do wish they'd add other seasonal specials. An Easter one would break up that interval nicely.

It's not likely there'll be a run of episodes before next Christmas, and no chance of an Easter special - Sherlock S4 doesn't even start filming until after Easter.

The bloody music though with clara right at the end ... the bloody syrupy music ...

Guy thinks he's scoring a Sylvanian Families advert

Caught up now - This was great (Maisie Williams def. very suited to the show), previous week was pretty good without much of a payoff, the two-parter before had excellent evil Clara, but am I the only one that finds Osgood an unbearable Mary Sue every time she opens her mouth?

"You'll find it's a very small universe when I'm angry with you." Potentially cheesy line but Capaldi's line reading was *ridiculously* perfect.

Osgood was more fun when when she was a dithery weirdo in the previous seasons; not sure competency suits her.

I like Clara just fine now, way more than I did at first, idg what you're all complaining about

but it doesn't matter now anyway *sob*

I am surprised I don't find Osgood annoying in the way Andrew suggests but that could be because I sound nothing like her

the music in last night's episode was a bit "naff" as you say. And poorly mixed!

Capaldi is going to be one of the top three all time.

so is clara dead or did i miss an episode? that was really cool w the girl from got.

if she really is gone well that is too bad. interesting that they sent her character off on such a saintly note. when did we first meet her, when she was in the Dalek?

Oswin was in the Dalek in Asylum Of The Dalek, Beryl/Victorian Clara was in The Snowmen, present-day non-splinter OG Clara was first in Bells Of St John.

(Dragonfire is the earliest actual story we've retroactively seen a splinter Clara in IIRC, while I'm thinking about it)

Have they Actually No-Really Killed Off a companion on screen before? Adric doesn't count.

I'm wondering how they're going to resolve Clara's death with the splintering of many Claras along the Doctor's timeline.

Also wonder if future companions will all be super special and magical, like Amy and Clara?

I thought we could have done without the cheesecake-for-the-dads reference to Clara and Jane Austen being lesbians. Or if included it should have been done in a way that an actual lesbian woman or girl could have related to. Sounds pedantic I know but still need to challenge these things. There were various other gripes

There was a very early companion who died in an aging machine iirc but I think that companion had only been with them for one episode anyway?

Sara had been in the show for nine episodes when she died, but all as part of one 13-part story.

Clara's bisexuality and relationship with Jane Austen have been mentioned in the show before, so it's not really fair to ding this episode for being insufficiently 100% lesbian.

Have they Actually No-Really Killed Off a companion on screen before? Adric doesn't count.

This isn't even the first time this year that Clara has been killed in a cliffhanger tbf.

(Adric doesn't count?! And Rory died for real at least one of the times he died onscreen, in Cold Blood - amusingly, he got resurrected twice from that one death.)

I'm wondering how they're going to resolve Clara's death with the splintering of many Claras along the Doctor's timeline.

Not sure what you think remains to be resolved from this plot that wasn't already resolved two and a half years ago and hasn't been mentioned since?

cheesecake-for-the-dads reference to Clara and Jane Austen being lesbians

btw, Dollard said on twitter yesterday she was getting teary thinking about Jane sitting & waiting for Clara to call, so if anything it was cheesecake for herself and if the dads like it that's a bonus.

Fair enough just seemed a bit 'for-the-dads'

Not sure what you think remains to be resolved from this plot that wasn't already resolved two and a half years ago and hasn't been mentioned since?

Well, not sure ... come to think of, iirc we're shown that the various claras who appear at various points in the doctor's life always appear in the background

i didn't even pick up on the lesbian reference there

I think MOffatt said she'd reappear 'in some form' so I'm sure we will see her somehow in the next episode. also, wasn't the whole theme of this season supposed to be "I save people"?

this was pretty brutal though, I really liked Clara, have never understood the complaints.

I might be reading this wrong, cardamon, but I'm getting the impression that you're reckoning from the episode that Clara's death removes all evidence of her life? I've missed where that's from, if so.

Thought the episode was rambling tosh occasionally punctuated by Very Good Bits (like most of the season). On the whole the death scene felt a bit flippant - compare how moving the policeman's death is in "Blink", after only ten minutes screen time - but feels wrong to judge when there's clearly business to come in the next two episodes.

akm I thought I was the only one who liked clara

I liked Clara

I think lots of people like Clara, even just in this thread. Some more so when she stopped being Mystery Girl, of course.

Yep, that's exactly it, when she stopped being An Important Character and just became a character.

Also like Clara! But thought her and Capaldi were more fun to watch together last season - script's fault, not performers'.

i liked clara

Well, not sure ... come to think of, iirc we're shown that the various claras who appear at various points in the doctor's life always appear in the background

...er? The first time we saw one, the Doctor was in constant communication with her for the bulk of the episode, and the big episode-climax twist came when he finally managed to get face-to-face with her. The second time we saw one, they interacted directly from about 30 seconds into her screentime, as she followed him in the coach, fought off the snowmen in the street with him, argued him out of wiping her memory with a big worm, secretly stalked him to his hidden lair in the park and followed him up the staircase, etc etc, died in front of him after the battle with the ice governess. The one that told baby Hartnell to steal the knackered Type 40 did so to his face - it's how he heard her.

also, wasn't the whole theme of this season supposed to be "I save people"?

Supposed by whom? And as opposed to the other 34 seasons?

Yep, that's exactly it, when she stopped being An Important Character and just became a character.

BTW, I say this every year, but if you rewatch those six episodes, Clara herself is being written and played as the same character - it's only the Doctor's treatment of her that makes her The Impossible Girl, and the moral of that arc is that he is a prick to treat her as a mystery, instead of a person/character.

Anyway, Clara's death in this episode is overshadowing what a great piece of work and packed with ideas it is - trap streets being real is a great hook for a Doctor Who episode, but it's wrapped and discarded in five minutes. Given the two-parter or two-parter-ish structure of this year, Me's return would have been a great surprise if not spoilered upthread. The development of her characterisation was fantastic, her ingrained sense of rage and entitlement channeled into helping others - many or most with greater skills or abilities than her, but relying on her force of will for protection - while still feeding her resentment and sense of moral superiority over the Doctor. A refugee camp for aliens (hiding from the Doctor as much as the dominant species) is not only a fine idea in itself, but adds many extra layers of nuance to the already-layered parallels in the Zygon two-parter.

And structurally, the way it keeps escalating! Starting in media res at the conclusion of some grand unseen adventure, the call from Rigsy suggests that this will be a money-saving small-scale story, especially with the focus on the "new human" - and some great Doctory business there, mixing Eleven's affinity for humans with S8's inability to comprehend them - but then the countdown tattoo baffles the Doctor, then becomes a certain death, then the trap street mystery, then an alien murder mystery - and all along in both the episode and the season, we've seen Clara's foolhardiness and cockiness escalating. Now when she takes the tattoo from Rigsy, it first plays as a calculation, a trick they're playing, one of her skilful and useful lies. But we get an increasing feeling of it being more sinister, until it escalates into a fulfilment of the Clara-as-Doctor trope from last year - she is more breakable, her bossiness and her lying and her outsized belief in her control freak abilities have proven her undoing, and she has the equivalent of a 1974 or 1981 or 1984 regeneration scene* - she's made a small, dumb sacrifice in a universe of grand gestures, and expects the people around her to grow and be better for it.

* actually the only three regeneration scenes in the classic series, now I think about it

didn't like it. it felt slight and, again, undeserving of the expended emotion and acting chops. (what Chuck ^^ said "compare how moving the policeman's death is in "Blink"").

It's just me isn't it. Shame, I really liked last season

No I kind of agree

"also, wasn't the whole theme of this season supposed to be "I save people"?

Supposed by whom? And as opposed to the other 34 seasons?"

it was spelled out extremely explicitly by the Doctor himself when he remembered why he chose the face he did and decided to save Ashildr

apparently the last epsiode of the season (before X-mas River Song return) takes place on Gallifrey

also, still not explanation for how there was a danny pink looking descendent of (apparently) hers in the far future, seems weird to leave that hanging. and since clara is allegedly in the final episode, in some manner, I'm hoping they sort that out

But he didn't say "this is the overarching theme of this season, take notes," he was affirming something to himself. And how is that different to every single episode in the last 52 years except for Horror Of Fang Rock pt 4?

xp

still not explanation for how there was a danny pink looking descendent of (apparently) hers in the far future, seems weird to leave that hanging

It got left hanging because Coleman changed her mind about leaving last year; just have fun making up your own explanations.

also, stfu with spoilers for fuck's sake, neither of those are apparent from what's been shown

Based on Moffat's previous form, I'm guessing he'll tie up the Danny Pink storyline in the season finale - the question is whether it's part of Moffat's grand narrative (he always has a grand narrative) or whether it just gets handwaved away randomly (which he's also fond of).

Orson Pink's story happened for the Doctor and Clara but later proved to be an abandoned timeline, obvs.

Have they Actually No-Really Killed Off a companion on screen before? Adric doesn't count.

The First Doctor had a companion named Katarina who blasted herself out of an airlock

WHO FACTS

xp Great post sic. Sums up why I loved this episode.

ta!

ditto sic

hail sic

I feel I've drifted away from the show after Matt Smith's first season and the disappointment in his second. I still watch it but it's usually catching up on the DVR when I'm eating lunch or doing other things before work. This season has pulled my attention away more than any in a while, and despite the dud found footage episode I watched this morning, it's been very good. I really liked this last one a lot, even as I struggle to remember who Rigsy is and have vague memories of the Danny Pink storyline mentioned above (that's how out of it I am). I think I need to properly reassess last season and see how I feel about it without distractions, because I'm genuinely excited for the finale and the show for the first time since the 50th anniversary and if I'm honest with myself, maybe even the second Matt Smith season.

Rigsy was from Flatline where he was doing community work as a sentence for his grafitti. He appears to be a great artist as you can see at the end of this latest episode. Not sure what the Doctor will make of it though.

Did they explain the move from Bristol where I think that was set, to London where this one was?

I couldn't think of the correct word for the scheme where offenders are made to do maintenance etc work on local areas. It's 'community service' isn't it?
Same thing as the group in Misfits I think.

so this episode was basically dark souls with the moonchild from the invisibles as the monster huh

(also pretty great)

Pretty much a perfect episode, this is what happens when you do a story properly

I was legit terrified all the way through

Yeah, this was terrific. Very effective.

Really going full Kafka

Perfect stylistic choices making the castle seem like something from 70s Hammer Horror or ... 70s doctor who

I'm jealous

Letting the conceit of the story (So there's this mysterious castle, where ...) do its work

CGI used to help tell a story

Like, it for real didn't occur to me until thinking about it afterwards that the castle moving about was done on a computer - and not because it was photo-realistic

MR James

The cg flies were very cg

Wondering if the events of this week's episode take place in any kind of real time. Or if it's all some kind of hyper thing. So would look different from outside. That what seemed an eternity for him might be no time in real time.

Beautifully done. i like the unspoken pun of the "clock tower"

Favorite 12 episode so far, top 5 episode of the series, possibly favorite nu-Who episode

Just wondering if there is a repeat of the Beethoven time paradox going to be afoot. Wondering if the entity that was employing Ashildr/Me is going to turn out to be a future Doctor.
Though apparently collateral damage so far incurred might undermine that.

Yeah that was pretty fuckin marvellous. And legitimately scary in places! Definitely a favorite

Friend pointed out to me lots of subtle Dracula/Nosferatu references as well + omg 'clock tower'

Wouldn't it be easier to break the Tardis out with one of the shovels instead of just punching it? I mean considering punching it required going "AAAAH!" for like two seconds after every smack.

"Hell is just Heaven for bad people" was a classic

i picked up some Frankenstein/Dracula references, some parts felt v 30's universal horror in places

What is the Bird story from.
From what i can recall of hearing it before, there is a vast ball of something at some point in the universe. Every thousand years a tiny bird flies by it and brushes it with its wing. By the time that wears it down to nothing you will have reached the first measure of eternity or something along those lines.
I think it might be a religious parable of some kind that is mentioned by a famous writer. & I think that is what the Doctor is referring to by the word Bird, I think he partially tells the story too.

Wouldn't it be easier to break the Tardis out with one of the shovels instead of just punching it? I mean considering punching it required going "AAAAH!" for like two seconds after every smack.

The shovel is out in the corridor and the Veil is approaching & blocking the doorway by the time he realises where he is. He can't get back to get it, he only has time to hit it a few times. (He obviously at least kicks it sometimes, given the shape of the tunnel, so maybe he does hold onto the shovel 5 or 6 billion times. I'm fine with not seeing every one of them though.)

I think it might be a religious parable of some kind that is mentioned by a famous writer. & I think that is what the Doctor is referring to by the word Bird, I think he partially tells the story too.

The Doctor cites the Brothers Grimm and tells (one third of) the story over and over and over, getting a tiny bit further along through it every few thousand years, as his punches wear away the "diamond" wall. When he's worn away the wall enough for it to take the Veil one step longer to reach him, he can say another word. This is all onscreen.

http://www.grimmstories.com/en/grimm_fairy-tales/the_shepherd_boy

ppl will probably disagree but i thought that whole look how much time has passed montage was a bit much -- i got the idea early on and then all the intercut falling and punching got dull fast. i guess it would have felt a bit of a letdown if it just cut past it too quickly tho?

no way, the buildup to "if I didn't know better I'd say we were TWO BILLION years in the future" was spectacular.

yeah, the relentlessness of it all was done really well

So: Did he say 'The Hybrid is me' or 'The Hybrid is Me'?

That was excellent - the moment you realise he's using eternity to punch through the crystal - such a lovely, moving payoff.

Fantastic episode, yep. Moffat back up to the standard of RTD era Moffat stories, perhaps better.

When I realised he was going to be on his own all the way through my first thought was that episode of The Deadly Assassin where (and my memory is fuzzy but) he seems to spend the whole thing searching through the death zone (or is it the matrix?) on his own while a range of surreal and nightmarish things happen around him. This was better than that, but I wonder whether there's an intentional parallel - if I'm remembering this right, The Deadly Assassin was the first story after the departure of Sarah Jane Smith, the original run's longest serving companion. And this was the first story after the departure of Clara, the new run's longest serving companion.

Another great line was "I seem to have run out of corridor"

ppl will probably disagree but i thought that whole look how much time has passed montage was a bit much

People will definitely disagree, it was the most exhilarating sequence I can remember seeing on Who for a long time.

Everyone OTM, it was top notch, incredibly clever, and Capaldi probably deserves an Emmy for this episode.

Reminded me a bit of:
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/e/e5/Annihilation_by_jeff_vandermeer.jpg

Kind of wondering to what extent the events of that episode were real, and if that effects his ability to regenerate or how many further regenerations he has now.
Are we going to find that this was actually a dream or a hyperspacial hypertime hallucination that took place as he was transported from hidden London to wherever his final destination from there was.
That he's actually been having to break out of his own psyche? & that no time has actually passed for any body outside of his immediate circumstances? Rather than the billions of years mentioned.

No I think it was real.

Won't effect his regenerations at all, no more than being teleported under normal circumstances would.

This was dope (altho almost every penultimate season ep has been) but I didn't quite get how the crystal wall and the constellations/night sky were exempt from the time loop? Conditions of the confession dial design imposed by the Doctor himself? Like failsafe measures or something? Or even just bugs in the system that he worked out (prefer this idea)? Or some other perfectly clear explanation I missed but care about too much?

Just because, I think.

This was dope (altho almost every penultimate season ep has been) but I didn't quite get how the crystal wall and the constellations/night sky were exempt from the time loop?
>

If it's real the loop is more an individual entering a situation that he can only acquire knowledge of from his own experience which is up to the point he's transported from London. It's several billion nearly identical clones of the original arriving Doctor experiencing a close repeat of the same situation. Only he's moved further through the diamond each time, so the results differ.
Progress is very slow because his hand is not an unstoppable force, whereas the object he's moving through is. That's where the brothers Grimm story ties in. (I think I've heard that in at least a couple of different forms from different sources through, same story to the same effect. So I do still think I've heard that somewhere other than the version quoted in the programme)
So I am still wondering if the apparent billions of years that have passed inside the world the doctor's clones inhabit is going to have passed outside of that world/pocket universe or possibly dream.

Isn't that device that he's been carrying throughout the season the same thing that David Tennant trapped his psyche/Timelord identity in to become John Smith the first world war teacher to hide from whoever's looking for him back in David Tennant days? & also how the Derek Jacobi character at the end of time doesn't know he is the same entity as the John Simm Master. Seems to be a standard Timelord device if I'm thinking right.

No, Tennant and John Simm both used pocket watches. There's even a term for it: 'fobwatched Timelord'.

Everything in the castle apart from the exit was clockwork, so of course it re-set (or just made a circuit, like the hands on a clock face). So you'd have adding-up skulls and the stars reflecting measured time because this was also a customised nightmare: to be stuck in Einstein's definition of insanity, or something, forever.

My speculation is that for the Doctor, each story this series was looplooploop, and we're just seeing the instance in each episode where he changed a loop subtly after figuring out he was looplooplooping, and then escaped. So the last episode is Houdini-ing his way out of another loop, with finale-ish results.

Emmy/BAFTA chat: Mark Rylance and Ben Whishaw might have something to say about that, although I admit, every time there was a lull in the episode, my brain interrupted with GRITTY BAFTA. But award logic is a funny thing and may favour Capaldi.

No, Tennant and John Simm both used pocket watches. There's even a term for it: 'fobwatched Timelord'.
>
I would have expected a device as private as that to come with some form of chameleon circuit so it wasn't overly conspicuous. & so it could be hidden amongst other things. & the purpose of that device seemed to be along the same lines, if I read that right.

So whatever that device sis might go through as many different designs as a sonic screwdriver or something.

Don't think much (if any) real-world time passes here, since once the Doctor gets out, he's on a planet with a city and a human-looking child.

that planet is gallifrey, which is probably far in the future/in a pocket universe/outside normal laws of time

As far as we know, Gallifrey is still locked outside of our universe/timestream. It seems plausible that the non-resetting 'diamond' wall was part of the border between our universe and wherever Gallifrey is now.

There's even a term for it: 'fobwatched Timelord'.

My first thought was "seems unlikely since it's not spelled "Timelord"," but I googled and it seems this is a fanfic phrase.

I was wondering if the Doctor had somehow realised that the only way he could get to Gallifrey was to go through the process that he underwent during the last couple of episodes and subsequently gone back around his own timestream to set things in motion. Didn't want to give away the end location so didn't say that in that way earlier. So the unknown entity that has hired Ashildr/Me to transport him to wherever taht is she sent him to was himself.
Buit from what I saw of the trailer it also looks like there may still be some level of dream state going on so things might not be as they appear anyway.

Funny that the population he's seen with in the photos that have circulated from next week's episode look more Western pioneer than previous non Time Lord Gallifreyan population have been shown. Though the last time they were really seen was Baker era (I think) apart from a few seen during the 50th anniversary edition, or was that other late Smith era?
& maybe the urban and rural populations dress differently anyway.

Interesting theory, but he can't go back on his own timestream - the teleport business in the confession dial was a bit different.

I was thinking specifically around his own timestream so he didn't actually cross it and therefore used Ashildr as a medium/agent for action. So set up at a time he knew he wasn't actually previously present or something.

i haven't posted anything on this season because I didn't really enjoy it all that much. the spaces and moments of repose present in the first Capaldi series seemed absent in this, or maybe I wasn't in the right mood. I enjoyed the Raven one, and thought Heaven Sent (terrible title) was fantastic. Didn't really get MR James from it (possibly people are thinking of Jonathan Miller's TV adaptation of O! Whistle and I'll Come to You My Lad), but Kafka and Borges short stories, yes. And Dr Fell's version of Kipling in the detective story The Hollow Man also kept circling round my mind: 'There are nine and sixty ways to construct a murder maze, and every single one of them is right.'

One thing on teleportation and time loops, streams and strips - loopholes in this area tend not to bother me unless they're unavoidably obvious. in a time travel series you're going to get some contradictions, especially over a long-running one, and to allow previous storylines to place constraints on the sorts of stories that can be told would seem to me to be the wrong order of priority. Still everyone will have their boundaries of what is and what isn't acceptable here I guess. What I will say a bit more didactically is that stories need to be proportionate to their aim. I'm probably risking the wrath of more knowledgable Dr Who fans with better knowledge of detail and better memories, but too often recently it's seemed to me that Gallifrey has sort of popped up out of the sofa cushions, having previously been presumed to have been banished eternally/destroyed forever/existing irrevocably in a parallel and inaccessible timestream. (Admittedly, I've had that experience when I've put down my glasses or keys somewhere). And also that storylines of great, almost meaningless complexity, ('how will it be resolved?!') have been resolved by a handy cosmic everythingy singularity ('oh'), less tying up threads than blowing them up. Here the story and reward was entirely proportionate. *Yes* it can only be reached after an eternity of pain and fear and adamantine strength of will, born of love, defeating the hardest substance in the universe. *Yes* he came the long way round, not the trickster's short way, and *yes* that was because, perhaps, he had run out of corridor (and yep that was a great line). And yes, it had to be personal, not involving sleights of hand with time or ah ha! because <handwave>plot of series</handwave>moments. The long route was the right route. *That* is the only way to reach Gallifrey. (And 'That was a hell of a bird' was a great line as well).

I also liked that the confession seal or whatever it was, turned out in fact to be a mechanism designed to *extract* a confession from the Doctor, and that once he had defeated it, refusing to confess that which he said he could never confess, he just tossed the confession out at the now-entrapped ghoul within.

So yeah, good episode, one of the best really.

I also liked that the confession seal or whatever it was, turned out in fact to be a mechanism designed to *extract* a confession from the Doctor, and that once he had defeated it, refusing to confess that which he said he could never confess, he just tossed the confession out at the now-entrapped ghoul within.

That's really nicely put, and I hadn't thought of that at all!

too often recently it's seemed to me that Gallifrey has sort of popped up out of the sofa cushions, having previously been presumed to have been banished eternally/destroyed forever/existing irrevocably in a parallel and inaccessible timestream.

Literally every single Gallifrey story after the first one* is terrible**, and I wish it had stayed destroyed forever in the new series, but tbf "too often" only accounts for about five minutes of screentime in the last six years, 30 seconds of which was last year.

I hoped Moffat was going to keep forestalling a certain range of fan's desire for a quest narrative as he did in the 2013 Christmas special and the tiny reference last year, but equally I'd rather have him hopefully try something interesting now, than a Chibnall or Gatiss or Thompson type come in and hamfist it later.

*which was designed to eradicate and undermine the pomposity and authority of the Time Lords; unfortunately the people making the show in later years just took the parodically ludicrous collars and restored the pomposity, without the satire or any apparent awareness of Holmes' intent and wit

**I like Invasion Of Time, but it's bad

hahaha there is so much truth there; I love all the Gallifrey stories but I can't make a coherent defense of any of them aside from The Deadly Assassin

(the bits of the Trial season that worked were emphatically NOT the Gallifrey bits)

I think there is a version of the Heaven Sent story that I would enjoy, but all the words used and all the things put on the screen annoyed me too much. Other than that it was fine.

what

Alan's been a gigantic Debbie Downer about this entire season

:(

This season is one of the three best seasons of Doctor Who ever, and might be the very best.

it's pretty easily my favorite season of nu-Who

and someone claiming that it didn't seem as slow paced as the last season is off the mark.... the 2 parters allowed these to breathe much more. it was still TOO jumbled at times but it's nothing like the ADD fast paced 'what the hell is happening' stuff in the Matt Smith years

The succession of 2-parters has been pretty welcome this year. I would have thought fans of classic Who would welcome the format.

I'm more on Fizzles' side - I haven't enjoyed this season at all, save for the Lake/Flood two-parter and Heaven Sent. Even with the two-parter structure giving stories "time to breath", I've still found it loud and bombastic, and a bit witless compared to the previous season.

You know, it's Doctor Who though, so there's still plenty of good stuff, Capaldi is great, it's not like I'd ever stop watching, etc.

The Zygon Inversion is witless compared to Robot Of Sherwood?

Yeah, I liked Robot of Sherwood a lot, felt like most of the jokes landed well, while the Zygon stuff was dumb and draggy.

Still - that's not a bad thing - in the RTD era, it was pretty clear cut which the good episodes were, and which sucked. It's good that the show's rich enough now to fight about favourites.

me and the young'un have properly enjoyed this season.
yeah we dont get all the inner dr who fan pleasing easter eggs, but for a visual addition to our saturday pizza/wine(me only !) session it has been a lot of fun.
oh, and i think capaldi has been brilliant.
not overly into the big acting scene that dominated the zygon finale, as it felt a little excessive, nor am i fan of the sunglasses, but hey.
summary : it's cracking saturday night tv for this dad-n-lad team.

I'm more or less caught up now, but I feel like the first part of this season was pretty uninvolving but it got better as it progressed. Capaldi has been brilliant but I preferred the socially awkward cranky dick Doctor we saw last season.

The season as a whole has leaned a little too heavily on base-under-siege stories, and the Zygon plot was convoluted bollocks.

I've become pro-sunglasses

I can't believe sunglasses have become a seemingly permanent wardrobe change, but not a fez, I guess I'll have to deal with it.

Fez offers no sonic utility

Doctor could surely sonic it up!

I'd rather see him casually mention that his hoodie is sonic as well

lol i agree completely

the guitar is totally sonic

So I'm fully caught up now but I may have missed an important detail in the raven one. Why couldn't the Doctor (or Maisie for that matter) volunteer to take the chronolock from Clara when they knew what was happening?

Because that would be cheating

So I'm fully caught up now but I may have missed an important detail in the raven one. Why couldn't the Doctor (or Maisie for that matter) volunteer to take the chronolock from Clara when they knew what was happening?

The issue was that once it was taken off of Rigsy, it was locked in and whoever had it would die; passing it on from Clara would require that she was willing to consign someone else to death, which would be totally out of character. (Also, if the Doctor took it and regenerated as a result, the entire show would have been Caves of Androzani part 2)

Why wasn't it similarly locked in for Rigsy though? What was the difference?

The difference was Me struck a bargain with the crow that she could cancel the countdown as long as it hadn't been transferred to someone else. I admit that my memory of exactly what happened here is a little fuzzy but my understanding was that Me basically could renege on the original deal (marking Rigsy) but any transfer of the mark constituted a new deal and any conditions Me had brokered were null and void (which is why Clara couldn't just pass it back to Rigsy).

I dunno, this all felt a bit convoluted and frankly avoidable, given the situations they've escaped from before. It detracted from the emotional heft of Clara dying. Well, that and the moment when Murray Gold decided to drop an extra acoustic guitar on top of his already dreadful overbearing score.

I thought the symmetry of Clara getting herself killed playing the Doctor to Rigsy's companion in distress while the actual Doctor watched helplessly made for good dramatic irony but it was a little clunky getting there.

Also I think if they were going to go down that road it would probably have been better to leave out the immortal character who has already been established as basically desperate to die.

Moffatt as been better than RTD at almost everything but both of his companion exits have been kind of bungled and he hasn't managed anything as affecting as Donna's last episode.

I figured the "cheating" piece was just because Me and the Doctor both have less than 100% chances of actually dying from the raven. And you can't cheat, so.

Moffatt as been better than RTD at almost everything but both of his companion exits have been kind of bungled and he hasn't managed anything as affecting as Donna's last episode.

Well let's be fair here, RTD didn't manage anything else as affecting as Donna's last episode, either.

Also I think if they were going to go down that road it would probably have been better to leave out the immortal character who has already been established as basically desperate to die.

Wait, who was this? I haven't rewatched the episode either, but Clara isn't immortal, Rigsy isn't immortal, we assume the alien family aren't because of their motivating jeopardy, the Doctor plainly doesn't want to die, and Me can die any time she likes.

Moffatt as been better than RTD at almost everything but both of his companion exits have been kind of bungled and he hasn't managed anything as affecting as Donna's last episode.

I'll take Clara dying because of her own agency over the Doctor refusing Donna agency, ignoring her consent, and violating her mind and memory over her specific objection. It's alright though, he gives her a middle-class bloke and a middle-class life as a consolation prize after he mindwipes her.

I dunno, this all felt a bit convoluted and frankly avoidable, given the situations they've escaped from before

Common problem in any story with lots of high adventure and terrible but never fatal disasters, the actual death of a character will tend to lose authority

I didn't think Ponds exit was bungled. Tragic, yes.

The music at that scene was terrible (said it before). While I think it's a bit silly to talk about the new series 'spoiling' or 'ruining' the old one - it's a new series, they're allowed to try new things and make new mistakes - the music is one thing that's been flat out wrong throughout the entire new series

As in, that's the one thing I concede to the 'they've spoile dr who!' crowd

I was about to complain about the nonexistent paradox in the Amy/Rory exit but then I remembered the tombstone.

they have toned down the volume a bit this year, I think. it's not nearly as irritating as it was with smith.

I noticed when watching on a TV that didn't have a home theater system attached to it that large chunks of the climactic dialogue in Face the Raven were borderline inaudible because of the score; I almost never experience that when playing the sound through external speakers.

It's a pretty constant problem.

Partly it's the choice to use warm, sweeping orchestral music instead of weird alienating synths

I can see why that decision was made - on a long list of basic things to change for the new series - but why have they kept it up when it's so consistently brought up as a problem by so many people

because it's beloved and acclaimed by many more people.

(and generically accepted as 'this is what adventure score sounds like' by the general audience, in all its post-John-Williams dramatic mediocrity.)

Beloved and acclaimed?

He's had fourteen* soundtrack CDs released of his Who and Torchwood work, and sold out stadiums in the UK and Australia for years with the Symphonic Spectaculars.

Here's the RT trembling wetly over his work:
http://www.radiotimes.com/news/2015-06-04/thank-who-for-the-music-doctor-whos-top-ten-murray-gold-themes

Here's a countdown of only the 75 best pieces he's composed for the series: "And so we’re into the Top Ten now. Ten of the best, most melodious and lyrical pieces of music ever composed." http://www.doctorwhotv.co.uk/a-golden-era-part-8-top-75-murray-gold-tracks-9-1-55769.htm

A vast amount of the acclaim for Heaven Sent was heaped on him this weekend. He's been nominated for BAFTAs.

If the general public and BBC executives had the same opinion as you or me or any other grouch in this thread, he wouldn't still be on the show.

*fourteen! how many pre-Ayres composers for the show have had even a single album released?

I thought Matt Smith's doctor theme was terrific (if eventually overplayed). I don't mind (although don't love) Gold's bombast-action-stuff; what's unforgivable is his tendency to drape whimsical fairground music over the basic dialogue scenes, as if he's afraid of silence.

Also just to drop this in:
http://youtu.be/wtgGkUuxglI

xp well I never knew that. world upside down

speaking of music, everyone otm obv, and i should watch it again, but didn't heaven sent use those great synths that characterise that creepy 70s tv vibe in doctor who and quatermass and the like? i remember for a few moments not attempting to block out all the incidental music for once.

There was a spot of that in the scene where he discovers Clara's portrait, though I'd assume it's not actual '70s synths.

yes, for a split second I thought they'd finally fired Gold.

So another craft that should have immediately run into a moon like the doctor's daughter apparently did? Or are we looking at a potential spin off show?

What we're looking at, Stevolende, is as near as perfect a resolution to that storyline as we were ever going to get, and in my opinion a genuinely intelligent mythologising of grief for children, where the portrait drops off the Doctor's Tardis like petals but also the lost person is just off having adventures in another part of the story

The restaurant at the end of the universe ;-).

That was wonderful.

Quite a lot of it was also shite though (but I will forgive a lot for the idea of Me and Clara as each other's companion).

One thing that galled me is they seemed to be playing the idea that it had been billions of years for the Doctor - it's only been a day?

He remembers that it happened, although that body didn't go through all of it.

Only the last instance remembers its own experience. Memories of each loop died with the 2 billion years or whatever's worth of teleport duplicates. He knows it happened, but it didn't happen to him.

But when he ends up on Gallifrey, it's Gallifrey near the end of time/space. Maybe 4.5 billion years actually did pass?

The time passed, one mayfly Doctor at a time.

a+ story.

well that was a mess of nonsense

1. he didn't feel the 4 billion years! it's just the last instance you're talking to!
2. what kind of selective memory loss is that? no logic whatsoever
3. are they gonna make out or what

The 7,000th Doctor says he remembers to some degree once he reaches the diamond chamber, then gets rebooted. The last time, he doesn't get rebooted, so the Doctor in this ep might not remember the 4.5 billion years passing minute by minute (note he has no idea how long it was and asks Ohila), but he remembers it happening. So it's not unreasonable to be angry at the one dickhole who caused it, especially after those other times he fucked you and the universe around.

I mean, I'm not saying it's hard SF that makes sense, just what the show said

Does it effect his regeneration ability that he's a clone?
&you might think that the system ability to produce an exact copy would wear down over time. So how real is real inside that world/device?

No more than teleporting in the first place would
And that's the question,misn't it?

Isn't what he's being reconstructed from in the teleporter more of a back up file than the real him? I'd think that the idea of teleportation involved transferring an original object between 2 points rather than cloning one and killing off another.
THis has always had me thinking of the film The Prestige for reasons i don't think I need to explain.
Or is the idea that is currently prevalent with teleportation that constituting a new version of the original from available material is as authentic as transporting the original? & certainly what he''s doing in this is constituting a new edition fro the memory banks of a progressively aging teleportation device, a process which is powered by the destruction of the previous edition of him which is already in the process of dying.

Well, teleportation is literally 'carrying something a long distance', but it's never been how it worked in scifi, from Star Trek on (hence them finding an old broken teleporter in TNG and completing its last program to produce an elderly Scotty)

I would assume that there would be something built into a teleportation process that said one object/individual in equates to one out. So there would be a veto in allowing a further transmission or release of the same individual. But one is going to need a database/checksum version of the transmitted object/individual to make sure that what emerged from the transporter was at least very close to the thing that had initially been transported.
& I thought what was being reproduced actually derived from this checksum version of the transported doctor rather than being the transported doctor himself. Would be one major difference from a normal transportation at least.

THough it's difficult to say what difference the location he was transported into makes since it is not a real world location as far as I can see and its own reproduction qualities may change things.
From what was said yesterday it looks like this was the penultimate receptacle for the identity of a Time lord. Almost seemed like a purgatory or place of self reflection before being uploaded to the Matrix which I'm assuming is more communal. So subsequently it does seem to me that that is what Jon Smith and Derek Jacobi had disguised as fob watches though the device may be otherwise disguised in other circumstances but I'm not sure how many times they've been encountered. But if it does serve the purpose I think it does it would make sense that each individual Time Lord had their own individual model.

I may have to rewatch this episode to figure out why nobody else appears to think it sucked

I didn't really like it, tbh. Though I thought it got a lot better in the last third or so, and thought it was a genuinely good endpoint for the arc of both Clara and Me. In comparison to Clara's death scene the whole 'can I erase another person's memory', 'fuck you I'm going to fight for my past even if it means the end of my future' actually felt significant. Me may be back later I guess, but while I had more mixed feelings about her story (and acting!) than the GoT fan club, I thought she was good + a useful counterpoint in this one. Also MAJOR PLUS POINT - right at the end THE SONIC SCREWDRIVER IS BACK FUCK YOU SONIC SUNGLASSES.

The Me that's in the other ship with Clara is the same one that has survived to the end of the Universe. Or at least that's the way it's been put across. So there is space for one that's a couple of billion years younger to reappear.
Unless she actually travelled in time to get there and wasn't being exactly honest about things.

Really hoping this doesn't mean there is going to be a series called the Long Way Round or something detailing the adventures of the pair. But it is open for other media spin offs innit?

ok now hearing "taking the long way round" to the tune of vanessa carlton and imagining some clara/me space montage set to it.

Stevolende I have been enjoying your posts in this thread

I haven't really taken to Me at all, except in the first episode where she was just the viking girl. Not sure what it is but I don't find her v convincing? Not necessarily the actress who I do like, but the character just never felt properly filled-in to me.

Quite liked this ep but as usual I find the timey wimey stuff confusing. I have learned to let it wash over me until they cut to the chase. I figure if it's crucial it'll get explained in more detail.

Upon being in Nevada again my husband remarked, "boy the English sure are fascinated with cowboy movies huh"

Suspect Me's character = Maisie Williams = Arya Stark and they didn't bother to actually make her into a character in Dr Who because you were supposed to just take all the acting as done

What do people want to see in the next series? (N.B. no spoilers or rumours, what would people like to see)

you mean besides Me and Clara making out

Being generally unimaginative, I'd like to see Capaldi's doctor get to do a callback to the K-9 + Leela days. Not with those companions specifically, but variations on the theme.

Um, I think a Capaldi/Captain Jack episode would actually be kinda fun.

For the sonic sunglasses to have definitely definitely disappeared. Also no more guitar. Anything else, fine. Though tbh I am fairly accepting of the cringe factor of Dr Who, it's always there in some form.

Oh, one other good bit from the last episode: even though it was so *blatantly* there to hammer the point home, the extra FUCK YOU BIGOTS, TIMELORDS CAN CHANGE GENDER... OH AND ALSO SKIN COLOUR BTW was good. (Was going to say 'race' there, but seeing as they're all Timelords the construct of race doesn't come into it.)

yeah that was cool!

i find the guitar & sunglasses v embarrassing, in an Old Time Rock N Roll / late period Bob Seger facepalm way

Veg, I'm with you on Me, but I think it's because, at least for me, I have a hard time seeing Arya wearing makeup and looking glam.

that too maybe. idk

I may have to rewatch this episode to figure out why nobody else appears to think it sucked

― El Tomboto

I pretty much think it sucked, though I liked some details. It was non-stop emotional crescendos, no sense of pace or balance.

Interesting, I thought it was pretty much a "who wouldn't like this?" kind of episode. Sic, what did you think, you're unusually quiet!

I think I don't generally like Gallifrey stuff. It's better as a mysterious society spoken of in hushed tones than a cgi city from 1995 and a cow shed.

The ridiculous willy waving from the Doctor on Gallifrey, the second parting speech in three episodes (all the worse because the previous one was actually good), the idea that the Doctor could have an entire diner materialise away from him and not put two and two together... There's definitely good parts, but it reminded me too much of RTD's closers.

I basically liked this right up until the diner dematerialized, at which point I was like "okay I am pretty sure at this point the Doctor should become a raging lunatic desperate to encounter Clara again"

I felt a little cheated that that was the actual Clara and not a time fragment, actually; the Doctor spilling his heartbreak for the death of his friend to a fragment of that friend would have tied all of those storylines together for me and put a capstone on them, whereas here it feels like the Doctor really should encounter Clara and Me again but that's never going to happen in the show for practical reasons.

That said, I'm very glad that they revisited what 10 did to Donna and how unbelievably shitty it was (nb: I still think it was a great story, just one with a horribly tragic ending and one where the Doctor rampaged over the companion's objections to make the "right" decision that the companion didn't want; I also don't think, given the parameters defined by the 10/Donna resolution, that it was possible for it to have a happy ending). I know people have really had it in for Moffatt and how he writes/treats his female companions but I rarely feel that he tortures them solely for the sake of torturing them, which RTD does constantly, and then paternalistically deciding what would make them happy to make up for it (see: dumping Rose in a parallel dimension then giving her a Doctor she could bone, wiping Donna's memory and then giving her lottery winnings, making Martha hook up with Mickey <--- btw this is SUPER MEGA RAGE-INDUCING and I could probably write 5000 words on how unbelievably stupid and flat-out racist that particular "happy ending" was)

it feels like the Doctor really should encounter Clara and Me again but that's never going to happen in the show for practical reasons.

Any money it will at least once before Capaldi hangs up his screwdriver.

They're quite lucky to get someone in a mega-hit to bend their schedule for four episodes so far - getting the timing for that to match up with whatever Jenna Louise Coleman is doing next is probably not going to happen - apart from anything else this is a good ending for them, I can't see Moffat <enormous River Song is Back Next Week Klaxon sounds>.

Which reminds me: while this is a lovely ending, some annoyance is also caused by it being yet another example where Moffat can't leave anyone dead, ever - even after a great death episode for the character.